<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>vanity and security by HowCleverOfYou</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27601594">vanity and security</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/HowCleverOfYou/pseuds/HowCleverOfYou'>HowCleverOfYou</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stranger Things (TV 2016)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Barebacking, Billy Hargrove Has a Crush on Steve Harrington, Billy Hargrove Lives, Billy Hargrove Tries to Be a Better Person, Billy fights monsters too!, Bisexual Steve Harrington, Dating, Established Relationship, Everyone Is Alive, F/M, Facials, Fluff, Gay Billy Hargrove, Gen, Getting Together, Homophobic Language, Kid Fic, Light BDSM, M/M, Mental Illness, Misunderstandings, Modern AU, Moving In Together, POV Dustin Henderson, Post-Battle of Starcourt (Stranger Things), Post-Season/Series 03, Pre-Relationship, Recovery, Slice of Life, Smut, Teacher!Billy Hargrove, Teacher!Steve Harrington, Therapeutic Massage</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-09 02:35:59</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>19,393</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27601594</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/HowCleverOfYou/pseuds/HowCleverOfYou</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He’s grinning, pink all over his cheeks, until he sees Dustin – then his eyes get big and his mouth makes an o shape and he pulls the door shut behind him. “Dustin!” he says. “What’s up, little man? How, uh, how long have you been standing there?”</p><p>“Do you have a girl in there?” Dustin asks, craning his neck to see around Steve, as if the door is going to magically swing open. Steve shifts to stand more fully in front of the doorknob.</p><p>“No,” he says quickly.</p><p>-----</p><p>each chapter is a stand-alone prompt fic!! they will range in length, content, universe, rating, etc., and will each be marked appropriately in the chapter notes.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>199</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. what's love got to do with it</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>welcome to this prompt extravaganza (largely based off of @prompt-bank prompts) which I am hoping whips me into better shape to write before winter quarter starts. please feel free to drop me some prompts below or on tumblr at hectordelavega.</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "how long have you been standing here?" + "I may be an idiot, but I'm not stupid."<br/><b>RATING</b>: G<br/><b>CW</b>: none?<br/><b>TAGS</b>: established relationship, dustin henderson pov, billy fights monsters!, happens someplace between s2 and s3 I don't know I just do what the writing goblins tell me to, fluff, honest to god they're like an old married couple here, could take place in the 80s or present day it just depends on what youre feelin</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Babe. <em>No</em>, come on, you’ve gotta lay down.”</p><p>Dustin stops in his tracks and backs up a few steps. That’s Steve’s voice. Coming from… Steve’s room. Where he should be. By himself. <em>Alone</em>.</p><p>“<em>No</em>,” Steve laughs and there’s the low hum of another voice, too soft to make out. “You’re bleeding, I’m not <em>doing</em> anything with you tonight.”</p><p>Dustin glances over his shoulder back down the stairs. Nancy’s gone. Right? She left with Jonathan, Will, and Mike half an hour ago. Billy took Max and Lucas home. The only person downstairs is El – everyone else is accounted for. Which means –</p><p>Did Steve sneak some girl in? After <em>monster hunting</em>?</p><p>Dustin carefully, carefully reaches out and puts his hand on the doorknob. Tries to twist it without making any noise, but it doesn’t move far. Locked. Steve’s <em>definitely</em> got a girl in there.</p><p>Inside the room, Dustin can hear Steve trying to keep his laughter – his <em>giggling</em> – quiet. There’s the creak and squeal of bedsprings like they’re wrestling. And not, like, <em>sex</em> wrestling. Just. Bouncing. Maybe? The thought of Steve having sex makes Dustin shudder.</p><p>“You’re so annoying,” he hears Steve say. “I’m not being loud! You’re so – alright, okay, let me go so I can brush my teeth. You’re—” His voice drops too low for Dustin to hear so Dustin moves closer, presses his ear up against the door, and then stumbles back when the lock suddenly clicks and Steve pulls the door open.</p><p>He’s grinning, pink all over his cheeks, until he sees Dustin – then his eyes get big and his mouth makes an <em>o</em> shape and he pulls the door shut behind him. “Dustin!” he says. “What’s up, little man? How, uh, how long have you been standing there?”</p><p>“Do you have a girl in there?” Dustin asks, craning his neck to see around Steve, as if the door is going to magically swing open to reveal Steve’s mystery girlfriend. Steve shifts to stand more fully in front of the doorknob.</p><p>“No,” he says quickly.</p><p>“I heard you talking to someone.”</p><p>“I was, uh, I was on the phone.” Dustin opens his mouth to ask <em>who</em> and Steve must read it on his face because he says, “With Nancy. Just making sure she got home okay.”</p><p>Dustin narrows his eyes. “You call Nancy <em>babe</em>?”</p><p>Steve blinks, mouth falling open again, like his brain is stalling in its tracks. “Uhh,” he says. “Look, it’s – you wouldn’t understand.”</p><p>“I’ve had girlfriends before, <em>Steve</em>.”</p><p>Steve puts his hands on Dustin’s shoulders, spins him around, and steers him down the hallway towards the guest rooms where he and El are staying for the night. Dustin tried pitching that the three of them should sleep in the same room, just to be safe – like downstairs by the TV, or all in one of the guest rooms – but Steve had said no, that they were all getting a separate room because Hopper wouldn’t like the idea of his daughter sleeping with two guys. <em>Gross</em> Dustin had said and both Steve and El rolled their eyes.</p><p>“Go to bed, Dustin,” he says. “Is El up here yet? Look, if you’re really freaked out, you guys can share a room. I won’t tell Hop.”</p><p>“But what about you?” Dustin asks, trying in vain to twist out of Steve’s grasp. “Does your <em>girlfriend</em> know what we did tonight? What’s she going to think if, if a demodog, like, bursts in through the window, and you’ve gotta – I don’t know, what if she gets in the way and you <em>die</em>? Isn’t she a liability?”</p><p>Steve squints at him for a minute before pushing one of the doors open, shoving Dustin inside, and shutting it firmly.</p><p>“Good<em>night</em>, Dustin,” he says, holding it tight so when Dustin yanks on it, it doesn’t budge.</p><p>“Goodnight, <em>Steve</em>,” he sighs after a moment and goes to lay face down on the bed.</p><p>Dustin does stay in the room. At the very least, he hears Steve finish brushing his teeth and he hears El trudging up the stairs to her own room. He’s too pumped full of adrenaline from almost dying, like, eight different times. He can’t <em>sleep</em>. And now he’s curious about who’s in Steve’s room. He knew a day would come where Steve would find someone to date and Dustin would be an even smaller part of his life than he already was. The least Steve could do was introduce them so Dustin could maybe be her friend, too.</p><p>He stares at the clock and waits until it ticks around to three am before he slips back out into the hallway and takes up vigil on the stairs, halfway between Steve’s room and the bathroom. There’s no way his girlfriend could go to the bathroom without passing him. <em>Genius</em>.</p><p>Dustin dozes on and off for the next two hours. It’s almost five fifteen when he jolts awake to the sound of a door opening and closing quietly and soft footsteps along the carpet. Dustin is practically bouncing on the balls of his feet where he’s crouched and holds his breath until he sees – Billy. <em>Billy</em>. It’s Billy who walks past him, scratching at his bare stomach and yawning. The bandage on his chest is a little pink where Steve had dressed his cut earlier when they all got home from the hunt.</p><p>Billy doesn’t see him. Dustin blinks, rubs his eyes, slaps himself in the face a few times. Billy went home. Like, <em>definitely</em> went home. Dustin saw it with his own two eyes. He doesn’t realize he’s gotten up from the stairs and is standing in the middle of the hall until the toilet flushes and Billy comes back out of the bathroom. He hums in acknowledgement of Dustin but passes by without any sort of – <em>anything</em>. An explanation, maybe.</p><p>“G’night, dweeb,” Billy says sleepily. He goes back into Steve’s room and <em>locks the door</em>. The bed creaks and groans, and there’s the quiet murmur of voices. After a moment, Steve comes out the door, glasses shoved crookedly onto his face.</p><p>“Dustin? What’s up?” he asks, squinting into the not-quite-dawn darkness. “You alright?”</p><p>“Am I dreaming?” Dustin holds out an arm. “Here, pinch me.” Steve does, sort of clumsily. It hurts and Dustin snatches it back. “That <em>hurt</em>.”</p><p>Steve blinks slowly a number of times before he yawns into the crook of his elbow. “Are you okay? Can I go back to sleep?”</p><p>“Billy Hargrove is in your room,” Dustin says. It sounds way more urgent than accusing and Dustin’s not quite sure which he’s going for. He’s not really sure what’s going on yet.</p><p>“Yeah,” Steve says blankly.</p><p>“<em>Billy Hargrove</em>.”</p><p>“I heard you.”</p><p>“That doesn’t, like, freak you out? How’d he even get in here? I <em>saw him leave</em>.”</p><p>“Dustin,” Steve says. “Come on, man. You’re an idiot, but you’re not stupid.”</p><p>“What?”</p><p>Steve runs a hand through his hair and shakes his head. “Can’t we just talk about this in the morning? I’ll, I don’t know, make pancakes or something.”</p><p>“I don’t get it,” Dustin says.</p><p>Steve reaches out a hand to tousle Dustin’s hair and Dustin tries slapping him away.</p><p>“G’night, dweeb,” Steve says. He goes back into his room. Freaking <em>locks the door</em>. Dustin stands goggling at it for a few beats before going to his own room and laying in bed to stare at the ceiling and turn it over in his head. The little sleep he gets is restless.</p><p>El isn’t phased when Billy joins them for breakfast. Dustin watches him sit on the counter next to the stove and hold the bowl of batter in his lap while Steve cooks the pancakes on the griddle. His bare heels keep knocking against the cabinet door below with jarring irregularity.</p><p>Dustin wants to ask El what she thinks, but she’s too busy trying to float them over two mugs of coffee without Steve noticing. He always makes them drink orange juice instead even though orange juice doesn’t have caffeine and they fought interdimensional monsters last night and, like, they <em>deserve</em> coffee.</p><p>And then – Billy helps pour the batter in four new little circles. He turns his head to look at Steve and Dustin is expecting Steve to jerk back or <em>something </em>since Billy is way way way too close, but Steve just leans forward and <em>kisses him on the nose</em>. Billy scrunches up his face and ducks down to rest his forehead against Steve’s shoulder.</p><p>So. <em>So</em>. That’s. That’s something that’s happening. Dustin doesn’t really know how to process it. He wonders idly if Billy is, like, blackmailing Steve, or if the two of them got bit by some weird new, like, Demogorgon or something, and they’re making faces like that at each other because they’ve <em>actually</em> lost their minds. That seems more probable than the hand Steve puts on Billy’s knee when he reaches around him for some plates being intentional.</p><p>“Let him tell Max.”</p><p>Dustin’s head whips over to El, who’s not looking at them at all; she’s too focused on pushing salt around on the table with her fingertips.</p><p>“What? Why? This is something I <em>definitely</em> would want to know if I—”</p><p>She looks up suddenly, her face set. “Let. Him. Tell. Max.”</p><p>Dustin opens his mouth to reply, but Steve comes over to the table carrying the plate of pancakes while Billy trails with the orange juice and coffee pot. When Steve murmurs something about syrup and butter and heads back to rifle through pantry, Billy watches him go, then leans over the table to pour both El and Dustin a cup of coffee. When he sees their mugs are both full, he gives El a look.</p><p>“You sly bitch.” He says it like El says <em>bitchin’</em>: surprised and impressed. El grins at him and floats the coffee pot out of his hand to fill his and Steve’s cups. It makes Billy laugh which seems to make El smile even more.</p><p>“You’re really okay with this?” Dustin hisses to her when Steve comes back in, distracting whatever weird <em>fraternization</em> just happened between Billy and El. When she looks, Dustin follows her gaze to where Billy’s arm rests on the back of Steve’s chair, hand hidden behind his shoulders but fingers moving just enough that Dustin can tell he’s playing with Steve’s hair. Dustin watches Steve stir creamer into his coffee and then into Billy’s. He glances at the color and adds more, like he can tell on sight whether or not Billy’s going to like it. It’s weird in the way parents are weird, like they know each other’s habits too well. <em>How long has this been going on</em>?</p><p>El reaches out and wraps a cold hand around Dustin’s wrist. When he looks up, she gives him a small smile.</p><p>“Happy,” she says simply. She pulls her hand back to pick up her fork. “Now, pancakes.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. it's strong and it's sudden</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The summer before Billy leaves for college, he and Steve hook up a grand total of two times: once against the back of the building at the pool and once crammed in the backseat of the Camaro.</p><p>It’s not anything else. They’re not friends. They don’t talk now that they don’t have basketball holding them in the same orbit. They don’t even see each other that much, because they both have summer jobs and they’re not looking for anything, anyway. It’s a good way to blow off steam and a good way for Steve to test out if he really does like guys or if it’s just a fluke. (It’s not a fluke).</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>please feel free to drop me some prompts below or on tumblr at hectordelavega</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "I thought you were nice"<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>PAIRINGS</b>: Steve/Billy, Steve/OFC, Steve/OMC (brief)<br/><b>CW</b>: none?<br/><b>TAGS</b>: public sex, getting together, bisexual steve harrington, gay billy hargrove, i've never been to philadelphia please don't judge me, gritty approves, moving in together, dating, why do i always make billy so keen on hydration, billy hargrove tries to be a better person, billy is out and proud</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The summer before Billy leaves for college, he and Steve hook up a grand total of two times: once against the back of the building at the pool and once crammed in the backseat of the Camaro.</p><p>It’s not anything else. They’re not friends. They don’t talk now that they don’t have basketball holding them in the same orbit. They don’t even see each other that much, because they both have summer jobs and they’re not looking for anything, anyway. It’s a good way to blow off steam and a good way for Steve to test out if he really does like guys or if it’s just a fluke. (It’s not a fluke).</p><p>Billy leaves for college like everyone else. Steve starts working at a Radio Shack the next town over and that’s where he meets Maeve, who is pretty and quiet and sweet, and when they get to know each other better, it’s like she blossoms. She’s hiding someone goofy and funny and loud behind that shy exterior. They date for a while. She’s working on a history degree at the community college and doesn’t seem to mind that he doesn’t really have much furniture or that he’s still not sure what to do with the rest of his life. They stay at her place more than at his, which is fine, because it smells nice, like gardenia, and she never forgets to buy important things like milk or toilet paper.</p><p>A year and a half into their relationship, she starts crying over breakfast. The bottom immediately drops out from Steve’s stomach, but then she hiccups and says she wants to go to grad school in Philly, and he doesn’t even think before asking, “Can I come with?”</p><p>They move in June and Steve sweats through three different shirts loading up the U-Haul with her stuff. He’s leaving his TV and shitty couch for Dustin to take to college, and he sells his bed to the unit across the hall. He keeps whatever’s worth salvaging, which isn’t a lot, but that’s alright. He’s never cared all that much about having a bunch of stuff, not when it was the only way his parents knew how to say <em>I love you</em>.</p><p>Philadelphia is not Hawkins to the point where it takes Steve about two weeks to get over the pounding in his chest whenever he goes to the grocery store or takes a walk through the park and there are strangers <em>everywhere</em>. It’s not bad; it’s just. Different. He gets used to it.</p><p>He starts working at a plant nursery. He brings home flower clippings for Maeve at the end of every shift and she always gives him a big, genuine smile, but Steve thinks they both know things are changing. They’re moving in two different directions – or, rather, <em>she’s</em> moving and he’s stuck in place. Spinning his wheels. She cries and he cries and when they say they want to stay friends, they mean it. It’s the most amicable breakup he’s ever had and the only one where their relationship is just as strong as it was before, just without the sex and kissing and waking up together.</p><p>He lets her keep the apartment and moves to Cathedral Park to live with some guy who put an ad out in the paper. His name is Bo and he’s nice. He spends most of his time chain-smoking out the window and staring at the horizon. He does it so often that Steve thinks they’ve got to have a naked neighbor or something because he likes Philly just fine, but there’s not much he’d spend his time just looking at like that.</p><p>Bo teaches high school English lit which tracks, honestly. Steve meets a lot of his friends but doesn’t spend much time with them. He doesn’t go out much, but when he does, it’s to see Maeve or some of the friends he made while they were dating, or both. He and Bo aren’t close but they’ll split a six pack and watch basketball together sometimes which is honestly more than enough for Steve.</p><p>Steve is laying on the floor in the living room trying to massage out a knot in his lower back on a foam roller when Bo bursts in through the front door looking more excited than he usually does coming home from work. “Me and some of the other teachers are going in on group tickets to a Sixers game,” he says. “You in?”</p><p>They take the bus there along with Maureen, who is an art teacher probably twice everyone else’s age. Shawn, Marisol, Ken, and Reece meet them there. Billy and Violet are going to be late because of some field trip they had planned together running over.</p><p>Shawn introduces himself as the shop teacher. He’s got a wide smile he keeps flashing at Steve and Steve’s not stupid, he’s hooked up with guys before, so when he asks Steve if he wants a beer during halftime, he says yes. They find a little abandoned hallway steps away from the hordes of people moving around to use the bathroom and get more food. Shawn’s a good kisser and is good at sucking dick. He’s, like, nice, too. He pops a mint in his mouth when he gets up off his knees so he doesn’t have dick breath, even though Steve doesn’t really mind if he does. Sorta comes with the territory. He offers one to Steve, too, after Steve goes down on him.</p><p>The clock is down to five minutes by the time they get back. Bo waves him over and Steve shimmies his way down the aisle while Shawn drops into the seat next to Marisol.</p><p>“Steve,” he calls. “Violet’s in the bathroom, but this is Billy.”</p><p>Steve stops dead halfway through squeezing past Ken, which means Ken is standing up against the folding seat and Steve is almost pressed against him. Ken clears his throat and Steve goes <em>oh, sorry</em> and keeps moving until he can hover in front of the open seat next to Billy Hargrove.</p><p>“Harrington,” Billy says, surprised.</p><p>“Hargrove.” Steve reaches down and they shake hands. It’s not until he puts his hand back in his pocket that he realizes he didn’t wash his hands after he and Shawn were done.</p><p>“You guys know each other,” Bo says.</p><p>“We went to high school together,” Steve says.</p><p>“Oh, awesome.” Bo shoots up immediately. “I gotta piss before the third quarter starts.”</p><p>Bo leaves and Steve and Billy look at each other for a minute before Steve remembers there’s an empty seat and drops down into it.</p><p>“What are you doing in Philly?” he asks finally. “I thought you’d be in California.”</p><p>Billy smiles at him; it’s the same smile but it’s not so much a challenge anymore. It’s just. Nice. Effortlessly sexy in the way he’s always been. “I was,” he says. “I went to school out there and realized pretty quickly I needed to be somewhere else. I transferred out here for my second year and haven’t left. What about you? What brought you up to Philly? No offense, but I thought you’d die in Hawkins, gonna be honest.”</p><p>Steve makes a face at him. “A girl.” Billy blinks and Steve is overcome with the urge to make it clear they’re not together anymore. “We split up, like, a year and a half ago. That’s why I live with Bo.”</p><p>Billy hums and his eyes shoot over Steve’s shoulder for a moment. “So, you and Shawn?”</p><p>Steve can feel his eyes bugging out. “What?”</p><p>Billy laughs and leans in a bit so he can speak more quietly. “Shawn is an unnervingly nice guy who really, <em>really</em> likes to have sex. Always carries those mints on him.” Billy taps his own face, mirroring where the mint is pressed up between Steve’s cheek and teeth. Steve shifts it self-consciously so it’s under his tongue instead. “I speak from experience.”</p><p>“You slept with Shawn?”</p><p>“Everyone sleeps with Shawn. It’s kind of hard not to like the guy.” He smiles and leans in close enough that his nose brushes against Steve’s cheek. “Besides,” he says quietly. “I know what you look like after you get off. That’s from experience, too.”</p><p>When he pulls back, he tongues his front teeth and laughs at how red Steve’s face has gone. Steve’s brain is full of television static, but he’s saved from responding by the game starting up again. Billy shoots him a smile and Steve can’t help bumping their knees together.</p><p>Outside, after the game, they all stand around and talk a little bit. Steve keeps finding his shoulder knocking into Billy’s and he’s not sure which one of them is doing it. Billy’s hotter, almost. 26 suits him. He filled out in that way you do after high school, when you shed the last bit of that baby fat that nobody really notices until it’s gone. His hair is still long, but the mullet’s gone; it looks more like Johnny Depp’s and Steve sort of hates that he notices it complements the natural wave of Billy’s hair.</p><p>“Let’s get a drink sometime,” he finds himself saying and Billy smiles.</p><p>They do get a drink. Like. It wasn’t a codeword for anything salacious or anything. Billy lives nearby and they meet at a bar a little closer to Billy’s side of town and have two beers each, and if Billy goes, “You wanna come up for a nightcap?” before they’ve even left the table, that’s just the natural progression of things.</p><p>There’s a mess of books and papers in the living room, but when Steve opens his mouth to ask, Billy flaps a hand at it and says, “My roommate’s a nursing student.” He points down the hall and says, “Bedroom’s down there on the left, bathroom’s right next to it. I’m gonna grab that nightcap.”</p><p>Billy’s bed is shoved against the wall to make room for the two bookcases overflowing with vinyl. There are CDs stacked on the dresser, each with a resale sticker scratched inexpertly off the front. One of the posters on the wall is an artsy shot of the Golden Gate Bridge, while the other is an MTV tear-out from a magazine.</p><p>“You like it?” Billy comes in with two bottles of water stuck up under his arms so he can carry the mugs in his hands. Steve grabs the water from him while he pushes the door shut with his socked foot. “I hope you like mint. I figured we should probably hydrate.”</p><p>They don’t drink the tea until it’s gone cold anyway, and Billy has to shake out the comforter to find where his briefs went so he can go out to the kitchen for sugar. When he gets back in bed, he swings a leg over Steve and sits down heavily on his thighs.</p><p>“You know,” he says, crunching a sugar cube between his molars. “You were the reason I came out in college.” Steve raises his eyebrows and Billy hums in thought. “I was so thrown when you came up at the pool and told me to meet you out back after closing. The way you said it—I spent the rest of my shift wondering if it was a fuck or a fucking fight, you know? After we fooled around, you stayed and smoked with me, and I thought, <em>alright. Maybe I’m good for something after all. Maybe somebody could want me for more than my body. </em>Like, if Steve Harrington is going to stick around to shoot the shit with me, even after I beat his face in, then there’s gotta be more people who would, too, and I wouldn’t even have to fight them first.” He tongues at his bottom lip and presses a sugar cube past Steve’s lips when he opens his mouth, asking for one silently. He doesn’t really know what to say so he doesn’t say anything.</p><p>“The second time it happened, you made me drink half your bottle of water and then you dug around your coat for some fucking – <em>pretzels</em> or some shit, and you made me eat them while we sat there. I thought you were nice. If we met in college instead, I would’ve asked you out.”</p><p>“You didn’t even ask me out this time,” Steve points out, cheeky, and Billy flicks him on the nipple for that.</p><p>“I just kept thinking, like. <em>Oh</em>, maybe this is how it’s supposed to be, you know? With guys. When I got to Philly, I immediately joined the Rainbow Alliance and got, like, <em>hard</em> into the gay scene out here. I told myself that I had to be myself in Philly, that I couldn’t chicken out like I kept doing. I couldn’t get <em>nice </em>if nobody knew I was gay, you know? Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t, like, pining for you or anything. I definitely thought about hitting you up if I ever went back to Hawkins, but I always stayed here for breaks and whatever. But it wasn’t—it’s not like I was waiting to <em>find you</em> or what-the-fuck-ever kinda sappy bullshit that is.”</p><p>“Who knew you were such a romantic?”</p><p>“Shut up.” Billy reaches for his cup and drains the rest of his tea. He didn’t even put the sugar into the mug. “Like, I fucked other people and whatever.”</p><p>“I could tell.” Steve spreads his palms out over Billy’s thighs. “You’ve learned a thing or two since the Camaro.”</p><p>Billy rolls his eyes. “I’m just <em>saying</em>, I don’t want you to get this idea in your head that I’ve been sitting around writing <em>Mr. Billy Harrington </em>and <em>Mr. Steve Hargrove</em> in my diary all these years.”</p><p>“Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me.”</p><p>Billy is fun and sexy and pushes back at Steve when Steve’s feeling bratty or like he’s got too much pent-up energy under his skin. He needles at Steve for stupid shit like not tucking his shirt into his pants right, and after he meets Maeve he goes <em>you know she’s just like Nancy Wheeler, right?</em> He also pulls Steve into his lap at the holiday party his roommate throws even though there are at least ten people in the room neither of them know.</p><p>A year passes. Steve’s taking biology classes at a community college because he watched a documentary about water pollution on PBS once when he was crazy high and hadn’t been able to get the idea of having a career in water restoration out of his head since. Billy laughs when Steve tells him, then shrugs and goes, <em>alright, whatever floats your boat, babe.</em></p><p>Billy’s been staying at over more and more recently with the end of the academic year approaching, because Steve’s place is a mile closer to the school, and he has the added benefit of suffering alongside Bo while they grade. The apartment is covered in messy writing on crinkled papers and Billy’s unintelligible scrawling handwriting in bright red in the margins of essays.</p><p>They’re sitting on the couch, just the two of them – Billy looking over his lesson plans while Steve dozes in and out of watching Animal Planet – when Billy turns a little and goes, “So, my lease is up soon.”</p><p>Steve hums a little and blinks over at him. “You think you’re gonna stay?”</p><p>“I don’t know. I was thinking about a one bedroom.”</p><p>“That sounds nice.”</p><p>Billy’s mouth hangs open for a moment before he says, “You really have no clue what I’m insinuating here.” Steve mouths the word <em>insinuating </em>back at him. “<em>God</em>. We should move in together.”</p><p>There’s a long beat of silence where they just look at each other. Steve opens his mouth to reply but goes a little lightheaded by all of the blood in his body going straight to his dick. He must make a face because Billy inhales quickly and goes, “You know what? It’s too fast. We should—let’s table it for—”</p><p>Steve cuts him off by reaching for his hand and pressing it to the front of his boxers where he’s filling up fast enough to tent them. The sound he makes at the friction of Billy’s palm is a little embarrassing. Billy’s eyes bug out of his head.</p><p>“<em>Really</em>?” Billy says. “Like, <em>right now</em>?” He looks at the TV, where a jaguar is eating what looks like an antelope or something, then looks back to where his hand is pressed against Steve’s erection, then looks up to Steve’s face.</p><p>It’s the idea of waking up next to Billy every <em>fucking</em> day and not having to remember if he has any clean clothes left or if he’s going to have to borrow one of Billy’s shirts again, which is <em>fine</em>, except he always sweats through his work shirts at the nursery. One bedroom means no roommate. One bedroom means his CDs being eclipsed by Billy’s vinyl collection. It means grocery shopping together. Picking out furniture. <em>Making</em> <em>love</em> in a bed they share like an old married couple or something. It means this isn’t just them fooling around, that being <em>boyfriends</em> might not be temporary like he sometimes worries it is. They could get, like, a dog or something. Their mail would be all shuffled together in the mailbox. It’s stupid how hard the idea of cooking Billy breakfast on the weekends without either of them being away from home gets him.</p><p>“Yeah,” Steve says. He licks his lips and his idiot cock gives a little kick against Billy’s hand. Billy draws his hand back, mouth open a little, brow pushed down. “Fuck yeah, I wanna move in together.”</p><p>“Something wrong with you,” he mutters, but leans in to kiss Steve on the nose and on the cheeks and on the mouth, his fingers already returning to skitter through the hair at the base of Steve’s stomach.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. smiled with the risin sun</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>When he gestures for Billy to give him his hand, Billy looks at him like he’s lost his mind.</p><p>“What the fuck are you doing, Harrington?”</p><p>“Your hands are hurting. Come on, I’ll give you a massage. Gimme your hand.”</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "I'll give you a massage"<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>CW</b>: mild homophobic language from Billy but nothing extensive, underage drinking but not to excess (billy at 18/19 and steve at 19/20), nondetailed references to physical damage billy sustained from starcourt (such as seizures)<br/><b>TAGS</b>: pre-relationship, post season 3, post starcourt, billy is healing, billy is alive, hopper is alive, i gave billy an ugly-ass car because i don't think he's suffered enough, steve's life is spiraling out of control lol, billy has neuropathy and his hands are all fucked up, recovery</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Billy rubs at his hands a lot; it’s hard not to notice. When they’re all sitting together at the table, he’ll purposefully pass the papers and pens off to Max or Steve or Will to take notes instead. Steve’s suggested a few times that he should rest, that he doesn’t have to come to these <em>party meetings</em> if he’s not feeling up to it, but Billy just gives him a cold look. His hands twitch and he winces and the only thing that seems to make them stop is when he presses his fingers hard into the meat of his hand, just below his thumb, like there’s a knot there that’s been keeping him awake at night.</p><p>Steve isn’t good at the planning thing, not when it comes to Upside Down kind of shit. He says as much and Dustin argues until Steve points out that he’s only ever playing punching bag – and that gets him to shut up. Steve’s good at seeing all of the things in a plan that could go wrong and cause mass catastrophe or, at the very least, maiming and/or decapitation. He worries; he’s a worrier. That’s what he’s good at, except for the part where he can’t get past the potential maiming and/or decapitation to actually consider if a plan might work. At some point, his brain decides to stop worrying about Dustin being bitten in half, and he starts worrying about the awkward way Billy uses his hands instead.</p><p>Ever since Starcourt, Billy’s been pretending like nothing’s changed. He still wears his shirts unbuttoned, even though Steve has seen him avoiding mirrors, and, even though the Camaro is a mangled heap of metal somewhere in a government junkyard, he still likes to gun down the roads in Hawkins, taking corners way too fast in the white 1983 Saab 900 that Hopper seemed to scare up from auction somewhere. It’s ugly as fuck and Steve desperately wants to make fun of him, but every time he tries, Billy gives him a look and he decides it’s not worth the shit he’s going to get back.</p><p>Just because he’s pretending everything’s the same, though, doesn’t mean it is. He’s got a laundry list of damage from being impaled and then put back together again like some fucked up Humpty Dumpty. He likes to brag about having kangaroo tendons in his knee now, though, so at least he’s finding some part of it not-awful. He’s had a couple of seizures but the doctor says they’ll fade as they wean off some of his medications, so for the time being, they serve just to piss Billy off and scare the shit out of everyone in the room.</p><p>Billy’s sitting on one of the shitty plastic deck chairs next to the pool even though it’s barely March and it’s a cold day even for Steve. He watches Billy carefully blowing smoke rings into the air for a moment before he takes a tube of lotion from his mom’s bathroom vanity, two beers from the fridge, and goes outside to join Billy.</p><p>“Thanks,” Billy says when Steve passes him a beer. He offers Steve a cigarette and, when he shakes his head, he eyes the lotion at Steve’s feet. “What, you come out here to jerk off or something?”</p><p>Steve rolls his eyes. He takes a drink of beer, squeezes some lotion onto the palm of his hand, and rubs it in a bit to warm it up. When he gestures for Billy to give him his hand, Billy looks at him like he’s lost his mind.</p><p>“What the fuck are you doing, Harrington?”</p><p>“Your hands are hurting. Come on, I’ll give you a massage. Gimme your hand.”</p><p>“Give you my hand, my ass,” Billy says. He’s looking awful wide-eyed about Steve touching his <em>hand</em> despite being the one who plastered himself against Steve’s sweaty back in basketball practice not even a year and a half ago. “Don’t come out here with that queer shit, I’m fine.”</p><p>Steve doesn’t say anything, just keeps holding out his hand.</p><p>“I’m not holding your hand,” Billy says again. His eyes flick up to Steve’s face, then away again. “Don’t you got a boyfriend for that or something?”</p><p>“Billy,” Steve says. Billy gives him a stony look but finally huffs and drops his wrist palm-up onto Steve’s fingers. Steve makes a triumphant noise and rearranges their hands into a more comfortable position. “Relax a bit.”</p><p>“Relax,” Billy mutters. “If you try anything, I’m telling your little girlfriend. This better not be one of those happy ending massages.”</p><p>“Why are you so fixated on me touching your dick?” He digs his thumbs into Billy’s hand and watches the careful sigh that leaves him almost unconsciously. “And Robin’s not my girlfriend. You <em>know</em> this.”</p><p>“So she turned you down,” Billy says as Steve kneads the muscles just under his thumb. “Makes sense. No wonder you look at her like that.”</p><p>“Like <em>what</em>?” Steve wants to press a little harder just to be an asshole, but he came out here to <em>help</em> with the pain, not make it worse, so he bites his tongue instead.</p><p>“Like you wanna bang her.”</p><p>“You know guys can be friends with girls, right? Without wanting to get in each other’s pants?”</p><p>Billy looks at him quizzically for a long, quiet moment, before shrugging and leaning back in his chair. Steve has to scoot his a little closer to not lose the angle he’s got. “Guys are only friends with girls if they’re gay or twelve. And as far as I know, you’re older than me, and I’ve been out of diapers for quite a while now.”</p><p>Steve knows he means it as a shitty joke, is trying to get Steve all riled up and defensive, but finds his fingers slowing of their own volition. Billy notices. His brow draws together and he frowns, looking just like he did when he thought Steve was holding Max hostage inside the Byers’ house.</p><p>“No kidding?” he says. His voice is different and, when Steve looks up, his face looks smoother, softer, and his cigarette is hanging short and ashy from the corner of his mouth. Steve drops Billy’s hand and reaches out for the other. They don’t say anything for a few minutes. Steve watches Billy’s fingers twitch and tense and relax under his thumbs. It’s methodical and he realizes it’s relaxing for him, too, despite the fact that Billy Hargrove now apparently knows his biggest secret, the one he didn't even tell Robin because she figured it out before him. “King Steve,” Billy says softly, in wonder, as he lights another cigarette and looks up at the sky.</p><p>“Are you feeling any better?” At Billy’s confused look, Steve clarifies, “Your hands.”</p><p>“Oh.” He curls his fingers and straightens them out again. “Yeah, actually. Didn’t think it would. The stabbing feeling was getting really fucking annoying.”</p><p>Steve takes another long drink of his beer and wipes the remains of the lotion onto his sweatpants. Billy doesn’t seem to be going anywhere fast, not with the wistful way he’s squinting up at the sky, so Steve clears his throat and nods at him before getting up and turning towards the door.</p><p>“Hey, Harrington,” Billy says before he can get very far. Steve looks back at him. There’s a pause like Billy’s trying to come up with something to say. “Can you—we should do that again sometime.”</p><p>He doesn’t look like he’s taking the piss, mostly just like he’s a little embarrassed and out of his element. He’s not used to asking for help and Steve gets that. He watches as Billy breaks contact to pick at a loose thread on his jeans and tap out some ash from his cigarette onto the ground. Part of him feels like that not-conversation with Billy shouldn’t have happened and that he was stupid for letting it, while the other thinks that he might not be the only one around here with secrets.</p><p>Kinda hard not to have some these days in a place like Hawkins.</p><p>“Yeah,” Steve says. “’course. After your doctor's appointment tomorrow?”</p><p>Billy wrinkles his nose like he forgot all about that. “Later. After dinner.”</p><p>“Your wish, my command.” Steve gives him a dorky salute and turns back towards the house. Behind him, Billy laughs quietly, and Steve has to tell himself not to think about it – any of it – too much. He’s a worrier, after all.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>drop me prompts below or on tumblr at hectordelavega! can you tell i'm avoiding working by just writing fic! this is honestly inspired by the fact that my hand has been hurting a lot lately, probably from using the computer too much, and my chiropractor told me to massage it lol it's hard to massage your own hand tho but not all of us have steve harrington at the ready. also the byers don't move in this because hop survives and refuses to leave hawkins</p><p>what scent lotion did he use lol</p><p>also I'm not a doctor but I'm pretty sure if your meds are giving you seizures you should probably not be taking them (in consultation with your doctor)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. everybody talks (too much)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“A little birdie told me,” Hargrove starts, voice mock casual, “that you asked my little sister if I feel her up.”</p><p>“Fuck,” Steve says.</p><p>“Fuck’s right,” Hargrove agrees.</p><p>“I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><b>PROMPT</b>: be you. you're the only one who can.<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>CW</b>: steve (mistakenly) thinks there is an inappropriate teacher/student relationship going on between billy and max<br/><b>TAGS</b>: teacher!steve harrington, teacher!billy hargrove, what year is it idk, misunderstandings, billy is a dick, pre-relationship, steve means well but boy howdy does he not do an adequate amount of research before he jumps into things</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Part of Steve wants to intervene immediately. That’s the hero part. The more rational part, the part that sounds suspiciously like Nancy Wheeler, his high school girlfriend, wants to observe for a minute, get his notes together before he makes any assumptions or jumps to any conclusions. That’s ended badly for him before. Besides, there could be a good explanation. Maybe Hargrove is having a bad day and is taking is out on Max Mayfield. Yelling and finger jabbing the air might not be the most professional way of handling things, but Hargrove’s the same age as Steve and Steve is amazed that he himself remembers to put pants on before work most days. Maybe anger is Hargrove’s <em>thing</em>, whereas Steve’s thing is… pants.</p><p>The bell rings above him and he needs to go to his first class, but there’s something about that interaction that isn’t sitting right with him. Max tries to turn and go into the building along with everyone else, but Hargrove grabs her by the wrist, and Steve can hear her say <em>ow!</em> even from this distance.</p><p>“Hey!” he yells. Everyone looks at him, including Max and Hargrove, and Max is able to wrench her arm out of his grasp. Her face is red and a little splotchy but she looks more annoyed than afraid. He’ll check in with her later. “Just wanted to remind you guys to study hard and all that.” He holds eye contact with Hargrove for a minute, ignoring the kids around him muttering that he’s lame, before turning and following everyone inside.</p><p>Max is in his Algebra 1 class on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, which means if he wants to see her before tomorrow, he’s going to have to track her down. Maybe making it <em>two</em> male teachers who are harassing a fourteen-year-old girl isn’t the best way to go. Waiting is probably a better option. He starts with Robin, who teaches social studies across the hall.</p><p>“Hey,” he says, wandering into her classroom as it empties out. “Can I ask you something?”</p><p>She gives him a look. “If you’re going to ask me out again, the answer is still no.”</p><p>Ouch. “No, uh, have you ever heard about any students having problems with Hargrove?”</p><p>Robin’s eyes flick back and forth for a second while she thinks before she shrugs and goes back to flipping through the lesson plan on her desk. “No,” she says. “I know a lot of the girls think he’s <em>super dreamy</em> and a lot of the guys think he’s hot shit, but that’s about all I know about him.” She closes the binder with a snap and folds her arms on top of it. “Why?”</p><p>“No reason.”</p><p>“I mean, you’re obviously lying,” she says, “but I honestly don’t care enough to figure out what you’re actually asking about, so whatever.”</p><p>He sees Hargrove in the hall a short time later and nods at him in acknowledgement. Hargrove winks back all sleazy. They’re both first-year teachers but don’t cross paths that often and haven’t really talked to each other much outside of staff meetings, which just tend to be Hargrove making a bitchy comment under his breath and Steve, if he’s sitting nearby, making a noise of agreement. He needs more intel before he’s going to confront Hargrove about it. He doesn’t really look like a listen-and-share type of guy.</p><p>The rest of that intel comes from Sarah Hemmerling and Jordan Samuels during homeroom the next morning. He doesn’t mean to listen in, but he hears one of them say <em>Did you see Max get out of Mr. Hargrove’s car this morning?</em> He’s so focused on trying to hear what comes next that he doesn’t notice Dustin Henderson in front of him, waving a hand in his face and going <em>Mr. Harrington? Sir? Hellooo, you with me here, buddy?</em> for an embarrassingly long time.</p><p>During his lunch period, he ignores all the other work piling up on his desk in favor of researching how to have a conversation like this with one of his students. Would she be more comfortable if it was a girl talking to her? But that would mean dragging someone else into this mess. He questions not for the first time if this is something he should bring to the administration instead of handling it on his own. <em>But</em>, again. Too many cooks and all that.</p><p>He doesn’t learn much in the ways of how to develop this specific type of nonchalance and empathetic understanding while simultaneously teaching math to a bunch of high school freshmen, so he’s sweating bullets when the bell rings and the classroom starts emptying out.</p><p>“Miss Mayfield,” he calls over the din of desks and chairs scraping across the linoleum. Her head jerks up in surprise and she blinks at him a few times. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”</p><p>She drops back down into her chair towards the back-middle of the room and waves at a few of her classmates as they leave. When everyone else is gone, he pulls the door closed and sits at the desk next to hers.</p><p>“Am I in trouble?” she asks. “Whatever it is, I probably didn’t do it. I’m, like, actually trying lately. I promise.”</p><p>“<em>No</em>, no, nothing like that. You’re doing a great job, it’s cool to see how much your grades are improving now that you’re in tutoring.” He rubs the back of his neck and stares at the floor, stares at the desk, and finally forces himself to look her in the face. “There’s no way this isn’t going to be an awkward conversation, so I just want you to know I’m a safe person to talk to, okay?”</p><p>She looks even more confused. “O…kay?”</p><p>Steve scuffs the toe of his Converse against the tile. “I wanted to check in with how you’re doing. Is everything… okay?” He thinks he’s using the word <em>okay</em> a lot but doesn’t presently remember how to decide if he is.</p><p>“Why wouldn’t it be?” She squints at him. “What is this about?”</p><p>“Okay, good to know everything is okay,” he says, trying to keep them on some sort of script he might be able to actually navigate. Baby steps. “Are you having any trouble with classmates… or… any of your teachers…?”</p><p>“No?”</p><p>“And you’re dating Lucas Sinclair, right?”</p><p>“Mr. Harrington.”</p><p>Steve puffs out his cheeks. “Look, I want you to know that if anything is going on, it’s not your fault, okay?” He pauses and she blinks at him. “I saw you and Mr. Hargrove talking before school yesterday.”</p><p>“Alright,” she says slowly.</p><p>“I saw him grab your wrist.” To his surprise, Max huffs and rolls her eyes. “And I know you two came to school together this morning.”</p><p>Max sits up very suddenly, eyes wide. “Oh my god.”</p><p>“Like I said, if anything is going on, you can talk to me about it, alright? It might… be exciting? or whatever, but a twenty-five-year-old teacher shouldn’t be hanging out with a fourteen-year-old girl. <em>Especially</em> outside of school.”</p><p>“Oh my <em>god</em>,” she says again. She’s stopped looking at him entirely and has her eyes fixed on something, probably the poster on the wall between the windows that says <em>BE YOU! YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN!</em> under a picture of a dog in a lobster costume.</p><p>“You’re not in trouble,” he says quickly.</p><p>She drops her head into her hands and her elbows onto her knees. “I <em>cannot believe</em> this is happening right now.”</p><p>“So – and you don’t have to tell me if you’re not comfortable – has he ever…” He trails off, not really knowing where he’s going with it. Above them, the bell rings and she jumps out of her seat.</p><p>“Things are fine,” she says. “I can’t be late to my next class.” And then she bolts, whispering <em>oh my god oh my god oh my god</em> under her breath as she goes. His next class starts filtering in now that they’re done staring through the little window on the door at who was asked to stay after class. He rubs his hands over his face and forgets for a moment that he’s supposed to be up in front of the room, not at one of the desks, until he sees Will Byers standing awkwardly next to him.</p><p>“That’s my seat,” Will says, giving him an apologetic smile.</p><p>“Oh.” He jumps up. “My bad, man.”</p><p>The hardest part is trying to focus on polynomials when all he can think about is what the fuck his next move is supposed to be.</p><p>xxx</p><p>His next move turns out to be a non-issue, because Billy Hargrove is sitting in his chair, legs propped on the desk and crossed at the ankles, hands locked leisurely behind his head, when Steve walks into his classroom the next morning.</p><p>“Oh,” he says. He’s only a third through his second cup of coffee and his brain doesn’t usually start reaching its full functionality until he’s down to the dregs, so he’s not sure yet if he should be feeling threatened. He takes a long drink from his travel mug to try and get himself there faster. “Uh, good morning.”</p><p>Hargrove juts his chin out and up so he can look down at Steve without even standing. Then he drops his feet onto the floor loudly and wheels the chair around the desk so Steve can see him clasp his hands together between his open knees in what Steve now can’t stop thinking of as one, cartoon-sized fist.</p><p>“A little birdie told me,” he starts, voice mock casual, “that you asked my little sister if I feel her up.”</p><p>Oh. <em>Ohhh</em>. Fuck.</p><p>“Fuck,” Steve says.</p><p>“Fuck’s right,” Hargrove agrees.</p><p>“I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”</p><p>Hargrove gets up, kicking back a little so the chair goes twirling into the wall, up against the tray of the blackboard. Steve can see a thin white line of chalk dust running horizontal across the fabric as it comes to a stop.</p><p>“You think I touch little kids?” Hargrove is up in his face very suddenly, smelling like the spearmint gum he’s grinding between his back molars. It’s a douchey look.</p><p>“I didn’t know she was your sister, man,” Steve says. “All I saw was you grabbing her wrist, and then I heard she got out of your car yesterday morning before school. Honest mistake.”</p><p>Hargrove smiles at him in a way that makes Steve feel like Hargrove’s towering over him, despite Steve having a solid one or two inches on him. “This whole situation, Harrington, I don’t know.” He scrunches up his nose. “It’s giving me the heebie-jeebies.”</p><p>“Look, man, I said it was a misunderstanding.”</p><p>“You sit with my little sister in an empty classroom, just the two of you, door closed, and ask her if she likes being touched by teachers.” Hargrove blows a small bubble and pops it in his face. “And then you call <em>me</em> a pedophile for carpooling with my sister, who I live with.”</p><p>“Oh, jeez.” Steve puts his hands up. “I didn’t say that.”</p><p>Hargrove licks his bottom lip and steps even closer, close enough that they’re toe-to-toe, and when one of them breathes, their chests brush, and Steve keeps getting a face full of spearmint smell, and he’s not sure if he should start panicking now or later or what.</p><p>Steve is still trying to do the mental calculations of whether or not he’s about to get decked in the face when Hargrove lets out a sudden burst of laughter and steps back, all the hard lines in his posture going loose. He claps Steve on the shoulder before he’s crossing his arms and half-sitting on the desk opposite Steve, one foot propped up on the chair attached to it.</p><p>“I’m just fuckin’ with you, man.” He seems to enjoy soaking in the shock and confusion on Steve’s face because he just keeps staring. “Cool of you to be looking out for her. I’d’a thought the same thing.” Steve watches him take the gum out of his mouth and reach down to carefully stick it underneath the desk he’s sitting on. “I’m pretty strictly an 18+ kinda guy.”</p><p>“Okay,” Steve says, because his brain is still buffering around <em>it’s giving me the heebie-jeebies</em>.</p><p>“Not really my thing anyway.” Billy’s up close again and if Steve wasn’t trying to work through the behavioral whiplash, he would think Hargrove’s hitting on him, what with the looking up through his eyelashes and the tonguing at his bottom lip and the way he keeps looking at Steve’s mouth when he talks. “Besides, even if she wasn’t my sister, she’s not really my type. If you know what I mean.”</p><p>“Oh,” Steve says.</p><p>“Oh,” Billy echoes on a laugh. He reaches up and presses a finger lightly under Steve’s chin to close his mouth. “You’re gonna catch flies with that mouth of yours if you’re not careful, pretty boy.” He winks, flicks the line of Steve’s jaw, and is gone just as suddenly as he had appeared.</p><p>Steve stands there for a while after he leaves, unsure of what was the most left field part of that conversation. It’s left him with a weird mix of hate-interest-arousal sitting in his gut and no one to tell about what just happened. He’s not even sure he could explain it in the first place.</p><p>“What the fuck,” he says eventually, aloud to the empty classroom, and has barely sat down at his desk before the first of his students start trickling in and he has to rearrange his face into something a little less unsettled. He looks at the lobster-dog on the wall and tries to draw from its confidence at being whatever it wants to be.</p><p>He’ll figure it out later.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. you better start from the start</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“I don’t get the whole alpha-top, beta-bottom thing, you know?” Billy muses. “I work pretty hard around here, but you get all the credit.”</p><p>“Hngghh,” Steve manages.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><i>why did i write this</i> please enjoy the closest thing to smut you will ever see from me, I'm aspec plz be nice. also I wrote this in the time between posting last chapter and like 10min ago?</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "I work pretty hard around here, but you get all the credit"<br/><b>RATING</b>: E<br/><b>CW</b>: kink (facial) negotiated off-screen, sex without a condom<br/><b>TAGS</b>: eww but i guess i gotta tag this as, smut, ?, literally why did i write this, billy is a brat, top!steve harrington, bottom!billy hargrove, topping from the bottom, bottoming from the top?, i only know so much about this stuff before my brain goes ok that's enough for today and turns off all the lights and locks up the place, facial, sex without a condom/barebacking, riding, established relationship, or not??? whatever you're feeling i guess, I can't think of any more tags to include, i'm embarrassed by this, but i thought the idea was goofy and was like ok I guess I gotta, edging, billy is a tease, billy really said bottom rights</p><p>i mistyped 'barebacking' as 'barebaking' and now i need to write about nude baking i guess</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When Steve gets like this, his eyes are clenched shut and his mouth is loose and open and his brow is furrowed and every line in his face is tense, and he really, <em>really</em> wants Billy to shut the fuck up, which is why Billy never does.</p><p>“I don’t get the whole alpha-top, beta-bottom thing, you know?” he muses. Steve is leaving pink scratches all up his thighs from digging his nails in because Billy feels like being a tease today and so he’s been doing the world’s slowest bounce on Steve’s dick for the last half hour. Steve’s in between feeling <em>good</em> and feeling <em>real fuckin’ good</em> and Billy likes to suspend him here as long as possible. Not for any good reason other than it pisses Steve off, and because it’s fun. “I work pretty hard around here, but you get all the credit.”</p><p>“Hngghh,” Steve manages. His eyes are still closed so he doesn’t see how often Billy has to squeeze the base of his cock while he’s up here to edge himself off a little.</p><p>“Like, someone asks you, ‘what’d you do last night?’ You’d probably say, ‘I fucked Billy up the ass’.”</p><p>“Nuh-uh,” Steve grunts, which is no good, so Billy grinds down extra hard, extra deep, and clenches coming back up. Steve is busy acting like he’s being murdered and doesn’t see how Billy arches his back, throws his head back, tries to pant as quietly as he can at the ceiling before he gets himself under control again. Teasing like this isn’t quite as fun if he can’t keep his head above water.</p><p>“This is my story, so you’re gonna tell your hypothetical co-worker or mom or something that you fucked me up the ass. Got that?”</p><p>Steve moans, long and halting, in return.</p><p>“So you say, you know, ‘I fucked Billy up the ass,’ and, like. That’s true in a sense, I guess. Your dick <em>is</em> up my ass. But I feel like <em>fucking</em> sounds like you railed me within an inch of my life.” He watches in amusement as Steve’s stomach muscles contract and can feel his dick blurt out some pre-come in the way everything gets a little slicker. “I don’t know, it feels to me like I’m doing most of the work here, pretty boy.”</p><p>Steve only whimpers quietly.</p><p>“<em>My </em>proposal – and tell me what you think of this, I’m still workshopping it. Your coworker comes up, like, ‘what’d you do last night?’ and you say, ‘Billy fucked me with his ass’. <em>With</em>, you see what I switched there? Don’t get me wrong, I fucking love when you rail me, but bottoms don’t – we don’t get enough credit for all the hard fuckin’ work we do.”</p><p>Next time he swivels his hips, he must get a little carried away with it, because then Steve is inhaling sharply and moving from near-comatose to approaching complete desperation.</p><p>“Shut the fuck up,” he says between clenched teeth and starts pivoting his hips up to meet Billy’s little thrusts. “I swear to God, Billy, I’m going to fucking kill you.”</p><p>Billy manages only a fraction of the laugh he means to give and the groan feels punched out. Steve flips them over so Billy’s on his back, neck crunched at an awkward angle when Steve pulls one of his legs over his shoulder.</p><p>“Fuckin’ – fuck me on your ass,” Steve mutters nonsensically. His whole face is red and his hair is slowly frizzing in the humidity of the small room; loose hairs are falling into his eyes from where they used to be held up with hairspray. “Bottoms don’t get – fuck ass – <em>credit</em> –”</p><p>Steve comes so suddenly that he loses balance the second his body goes un-stiff, and he falls to the side. Billy sits on his chest and jerks himself off to the feeling of Steve’s slick running down his thighs and Steve’s trembling hands on his hips. His aim is bad because the first bit shoots right into Steve’s nostril, but he adjusts and the rest of it winds up on the bridge of his nose, his cheeks, his chin. Billy stays there, half on his knees, panting, and smiles down at Steve when he finally opens his eyes.</p><p>“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Steve says. He pauses to lick his lips and <em>that</em>, that gets Billy’s rapt fucking attention. “Did you just tell me you want the universal terminology of <em>fuck</em> to change so it’s more inclusive of bottoms who ride dick?”</p><p>“Yeah, I did.” Billy bites back his laugh until Steve starts laughing first.</p><p>“You’re so fucking weird,” Steve says, reaching up to wrap a hand around the back of his neck. “C’mere, you fucking – <em>martyr</em> for bottom-kind. I don’t even know why, but I gotta fucking kiss you right now.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. everything inside and out</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The second he hears a key scratching at the lock, sliding in, turning, he’s up off the couch, hands shaking as he yanks the door open. Billy looks a little startled. He’s got a week’s worth of unshaven facial hair, a cut above his eye, and is wearing clothes that don’t seem to be his.</p><p>“Are you hurt?” Steve manages to say. He grips the sleeve of the barbour jacket Billy definitely didn’t own last week and pulls him inside, down through the hall, and pushes him into the armchair in the living room. Billy looks at him with wide eyes and shakes his head. “What’s that then? On your face?”</p><p>“It’s okay,” he says, voice scratchy like he’s been chain smoking or yelling or both. “I’m fine, Steve.”</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>ok one big important thing is the disclaimer that I am not an expert on BPD at all!!!! billy's splitting is in part based off a manic episode my mom's friend's bipolar daughter had several years ago where she "came to" (so to speak) in arizona, having driven all the way from nashville. PLEASE do not take this as an accurate representation of BPD and, if it does feel accurate to you, remember that mental illness isn't the same from person to person. billy's story here might not match the stories of a lot of people with BPD. this is also not a good place to self-diagnose. I am not a doctor!!! I just read some articles on the internet and looked at reddit!!!!! </p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "take your medicine"<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>CW</b>: pretty explicit talk about a dissociative episode (BPD) triggered by - you guessed it - neil. medicine noncompliance. talk of suicidality and past suicide attempts. mention of other BPD symptoms such as impulsivity and violence.<br/><b>TAGS</b>: sad with a hopeful ending, mental illness, modern au, established relationship, billy gets the help and treatment he deserves, steve is a good boyfriend (imo), unconditional love, healing, mental health management, difficult relationship, borderline personality disorder, dissociative episode, suicidiality, mentions of past suicide attempts, showering together, hurt/comfort, sweet 'n sad, medicine noncompliance, steve has adhd, dustin has type 1 diabetes, steve is definitely billy's fp and that's part of why they go to couple's counseling tbh</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The second he hears a key scratching at the lock, sliding in, turning, he’s up off the couch, hands shaking as he yanks the door open. Billy looks a little startled. He’s got a week’s worth of unshaven facial hair, a cut above his eye, and is wearing clothes that don’t seem to be his.</p><p>“Are you hurt?” Steve manages to say. He grips the sleeve of the barbour jacket Billy definitely didn’t own last week and pulls him inside, down through the hall, and pushes him into the armchair in the living room. Billy looks at him with wide eyes and shakes his head. “What’s that then? On your face?”</p><p>“It’s okay,” he says, voice scratchy like he’s been chain smoking or yelling or both. “I’m fine, Steve.”</p><p>Steve’s had seven days to think about all the ways he could react when (<em>if</em>) Billy came back, but none of them involved breaking so quickly, but he’s on his knees, pressing his face into Billy’s stomach, before he even knows what’s going on.</p><p>“You fucking scared me,” he says, muffled against a hoodie that smells like stale air. Hot tears are running down his cheeks and onto Billy’s sweatshirt and he thinks he’s cried enough the last few days that this shouldn’t be happening <em>again</em>, but here he is, hiccupping out sobs that hurt his chest. “You stupid fuck, I was so scared.”</p><p>Billy doesn’t say anything for a while, but he does thread his fingers through Steve’s hair and press his palm warm against the back of his head, and he folds his body over so he’s huddled up, covering Steve’s shaking form in his lap. Steve knows he’s holding on too tight, that he’s going to leave bruises on Billy’s waist if he doesn’t ease up, but a big part of him is scared that Billy’s going to disappear again if he lets go.</p><p>Billy lets him cry for a while. Steve eventually forces himself up. He knows he looks like shit. He’s looked like this all week; he’s had plenty of people tell him that. He looks at Billy and pants for a moment before going into the kitchen on unsteady feet, trying not to keep his back turned for too long. Every time he looks over his shoulder, Billy is staring at the floor.</p><p>Steve blows his nose and comes back with a glass of water and Billy’s meds clutched in his hands, and he pulls the coffee table up a little so he can sit more level. Their knees bump and it overwhelms Steve so much—to have him <em>here</em>, to know he’s safe—that he’s afraid he’s going to start crying again. “Drink this,” he says. Billy does, drains about half of it before taking a breath. “Now you gotta take your meds.”</p><p>Billy’s hands start shaking, just like he knew they would. He doesn’t like talking about his meds with Steve. Or with anyone, really. “I have,” he says.</p><p>“Billy,” Steve starts. He hates the way his voice sounds, how it makes it look like he doesn’t trust Billy. Like he thinks Billy needs a caregiver. Like he doesn’t think Billy knows how to take care of himself.</p><p>“<em>Steve</em>. I have. I talked to Dr. Owens and he sent a prescription out to me. I took my meds. I promise. I took ‘em on video chat, you can call him and he’ll tell you.”</p><p>Steve hesitates, but eventually puts the pill organizer on the floor between his feet.</p><p>“You talked to Dr. Owens?”</p><p>Billy nods and drops Steve’s gaze again. “He made me call Lillian, too. I had two sessions with her and we went back through—we went back through my coping plan and talked about what happened.”</p><p>Steve reaches out for his hands and runs his thumbs along the veins in Billy’s wrists. He doesn’t ask why nobody bothered to call him to at least to say Billy’s alright. He’ll have to call Hopper in the morning so he knows Billy made it home. Maybe he should just send a text.</p><p>“Where’d you go?” he asks quietly.</p><p>“Wyoming.”</p><p>If this were anyone else, anything else, he would shout <em>Wyoming? What the fuck?</em> but it’s better than taking a plane to Belize and getting turned away at the border for not having a passport. At least this time, he had his car, even if someone did find his cell phone in the grocery store parking lot.</p><p>“That’s far,” Steve says, trying to sound as neutral as possible.</p><p>“Yeah. It took me a while. I think.” Billy pauses for a moment and sniffs loudly. “I was sort of. Offline for a bit.” Steve waits a little in case Billy wants to continue. He does. “I split really fucking hard, Steve. I just lost it. I saw my dad and couldn’t think about anything but getting the fuck out of there. I didn’t even—I didn’t stop at home for anything in case he followed me. I would’ve—I would’ve called you, but I just kept—kept thinking <em>I’m bothering him </em>or, or <em>he doesn’t care</em>.”</p><p>He starts crying in earnest. Steve scoots to the very end of the coffee table and lets Billy curl his upper body into his lap. He folds himself over so he can hug-cradle Billy, just like Billy had done to him.</p><p>“I was doing so good,” he hears Billy say. “I’ve been talking to Lillian, I’ve been taking my meds. I <em>promise</em>, Steve.” Steve’s jaw clenches but he gives Billy another moment to cry it out, to breathe. When his breaths aren’t coming out quite as halting, Steve touches his shoulder and Billy takes it for the request it is and sits up slowly. Steve gives him a wad of tissues from his pocket.</p><p>“You’re always doing good,” he starts and Billy rolls his eyes while he wipes his nose. “No, cut that out. There’s no good or bad with this shit. Not with <em>you</em>. Sometimes, things get rough. Sometimes, you see your dad in the grocery store and it’s fine, and other times, you spiral. You can’t control something like that. You’re doing everything you can to manage all of this.”</p><p>“You don’t deserve this,” Billy says.</p><p>“Don’t deserve what? Being here waiting for the person I love to come home? Baby, I’m not going to say it’s not hard. This past week tore me apart. I didn’t know where you were, if you were okay.” <em>If you were alive</em>, he doesn’t say. “But I didn’t sign up just for the high points when I said I wanted this, Billy. It’s not like I didn’t know what I was getting into.”</p><p>“I have to take meds to be <em>normal</em>,” Billy spits. “Fucking—one thing for the depression and one thing for the aggression and <em>something else</em> for the stomachaches I get as a <em>side effect</em> of the pills that are supposed to be making me feel <em>better</em>. Therapy every week to talk about how not to split when my fucking—my toast burns or some shit, and how to know if I’m going to freak or what so I can take deep breaths like a fucking <em>six-year-old</em>. It’s not fucking <em>fair</em>.”</p><p>“No, it’s not.” They’re both crying again. Steve wipes at his eyes with the cuff of his shirt, then reaches over to do the same for Billy. “It’s not fucking fair. But it’s the way the chemicals in your brain say it is, and it’s all we can do to just fucking deal with it.”</p><p>“I’m not<em> normal</em>,” Billy starts again, but Steve cuts him off.</p><p>“You’re not the only one here on meds, Billy. I have fucking—ADHD, and I have depression, too, okay? You think I don’t want to not have to take pills to get out of bed every day or to, to have a conversation? I know—I <em>know</em> your brain is telling you all this bullshit about what I want and what I need and what I deserve, but it’s wrong, all right? I <em>want</em> you, I <em>need</em> you, and I do my best every day to fucking <em>deserve</em> you.”</p><p>“That’s not the same thing,” Billy bites. “You don’t—you don’t fucking wail on someone within an inch of their life if you stop taking your meds.”</p><p>“No, I don’t,” Steve agrees. They’ve had this conversation a million times. They’re going to have it a million times more. “But your brain chemicals are fucked, and my brain chemicals are fucked. Simple as that. You think Dustin should stop taking his insulin because his insulin chemicals are fucked? Because he can’t be normal without them?”</p><p>Billy doesn’t answer and he won’t look at Steve, either.</p><p>“Hop’s got high cholesterol and high blood pressure. If he goes off his meds, he could die.”</p><p>“I get it, alright? I get it.”</p><p>“If you go off your meds, you could die.” Steve knows his voice is going to break before it does. Billy finally looks up at him, his face tired, and Steve knows he’s feeling the come-down shame, but there’s still part of him that needs Billy to <em>hear</em> this. “Your go-to is being impulsive even when you’re on your meds, and you’re working on that, that’s not what this is about—<em>off</em> your meds—”</p><p>He can’t go there again. The terror of Max calling from the hospital to say Billy drove through the front of Neil’s house. <em>He’s</em> <em>okay</em>, she said, <em>but I don’t think he wanted to be.</em> Billy walking in soaked to the bone because his brain said <em>jump in the lake </em>and <em>how long can you hold your breath? </em>and he did because he didn’t see it for what it was, in the moment, and if Hop hadn’t driven by and seen his car parked along the bank, driver’s side door still open, he could’ve drowned. Would’ve drowned. It’s why he used to drive fast and start fights and have unprotected sex with strangers, all before his diagnosis, all before Dr. Owens said the words <em>borderline personality disorder</em> and Billy had stormed out, knocked a painting off the wall in the hallway. Smoked three cigarettes and came back, sat down, and said <em>okay so how are we going to beat this fucker</em>?</p><p>“I know,” Billy says, his voice shaking. “I know, I know. I’m sorry.”</p><p>This is a losing battle every time. Nobody wins. It’s not Billy’s fault. Steve knows he would call if he could. Knows he wouldn’t leave at all if he could. That instead of walking along the train tracks in the midnight dark when the intrusive thoughts creep in, he would turn to Steve if he could.</p><p>Things are okay most days. Billy is happy and healthy and has a job, goes to work. Has friends. The longer he’s in therapy, the less splitting there is, the less he panics about what Steve really meant when he kissed Billy goodbye before work that morning, or how his friends being unavailable isn’t necessarily a reflection of whether or not they like him.</p><p>He hates when Billy apologizes. He doesn’t need to, but Steve can’t say <em>it’s okay</em> either, because getting a <em>just saw my dad</em> text at three in the afternoon on a Tuesday and then sitting on the couch and waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting, and finally calling Hop bordering on four am because Steve <em>knew</em> what was going on the whole time, knew that Billy had gone black and white and reacted. What he <em>didn’t</em> know was what that looked like and sometimes the waiting and the worrying is better than the knowing. So Steve goes to therapy, too, and reads message boards about BPD, because it’s not okay, but it’s also not something Billy can just <em>fix</em>. It’s not him leaving his dirty clothes all over the floor or running out all the hot water with his long showers.</p><p>“I love you,” Steve says. Billy makes a sound and Steve knows he’s not where he needs to be right now to believe it. That’s alright. Steve has a million and one <em>I love yous</em> to give him. He’s in no short supply. There’s a stack of sealed envelopes in the top drawer of the dresser of letters Steve’s written to Billy. <em>To open when you’re feeling off</em>, they say. Steve writes a new one every few weeks and makes sure Billy sees him adding it to the collection so he knows that Steve still thinks these things, still feels these things, day to day to day to day.</p><p>He’s had people ask him before why he bothers sticking around. <em>Isn’t it too much?</em> he’s been asked. They wrinkle their nose like the thought of being with someone who needs a little extra love sometimes, a little extra patience, is bad. Isn’t doable. They make assumptions, mostly about how Billy treats Steve, like they’re not both putting in the work to keep their relationship strong. To hold themselves together. To be good to each other even when they think they’ve forgotten how.</p><p>But the thing is, Steve has loved Billy so much for so long, through all of the worst of it, through all of the best, and, even if he wanted to, he’s not sure he knows how to stop.</p><p>“I love you, too,” Billy says eventually, voice raw and a little muffled.</p><p>“I’m not angry at you. I’m not mad.”</p><p>“I know.”</p><p>“I was scared, that’s all.”</p><p>“I know.”</p><p>Billy finally looks up at him and Steve leans in slow, slow enough for Billy to turn his cheek if he doesn’t want a kiss, if being touched like this is too much right now, but he’s the one who closes the distance and presses their lips together once, twice, three times. It makes things feel a little more normal.</p><p>“Let’s get you in the shower,” Steve says quietly.</p><p>Sometimes, Billy lets Steve shave his face. Sometimes, he gets that Steve pressing up behind him under the shower spray is because Steve <em>needs</em> that closeness. Needs to hold, to remind himself that Billy is okay. To be held. He spends so much time worrying about his actions and reactions that sometimes he just needs to turn off his brain for a little and be in the moment, focus on the way water drips off the end of Billy’s nose, focus on how much concentration he puts into conditioning his hair, focus on kissing the birthmark on his shoulder. On putting a hand on his heart to feel the <em>thump thump thump</em> against his palm.</p><p>Later, they’ll be laying close, heads on the same pillow, noses brushing, and Billy will say, “I can’t believe I’m lucky enough to have you love me,” and it takes Steve a long time to come up with something that isn’t <em>likewise </em>or <em>same</em> or <em>please stay</em> or <em>please be okay</em>, but he gets there eventually.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>please stay compliant with your meds!!! it's ok if you need to take medication to feel "normal." some people just do, my guy. (I do!). also!! plz be careful when asking someone if they're taking their meds or telling them to take their meds. it's different for everyone but was definitely a trigger for me at my worst. </p><p>someone told me once that they internally frame their mental illness <i>as</i> an illness/disease, and that's how they pull themselves out of feeling guilty about asking for help. you (probably) wouldn't deny a person with a broken leg necessary accommodations. you (probably) wouldn't tell someone with POTS or another chronic disease to suck it up. you (probably) wouldn't tell a cancer patient that seeking treatment makes them weak. this fundamentally changed the way I thought of my own mental illness and is ultimately what led to me going into recovery (yahoo) and I hope that sentiment comes through in this story. mental illness is exhausting, yo!!! cut yourself some slack!!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. all the pain and the pleasure's the same</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Violet and Claudia are standing right inside the door when Billy opens it, which almost certainly means they’re doing something they shouldn’t be. </p><p>“Hi, girls,” he says slowly.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>here's a sweet lil kid!fic to make up for the last one</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "quit stalling. where's your father?"<br/><b>RATING</b>: G<br/><b>CW</b>: none?<br/><b>TAGS</b>: silly, kid!fic, dads!harringrove, slice of life, established relationship</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Violet and Claudia are standing right inside the door when Billy opens it, which almost certainly means they’re doing something they shouldn’t be.</p><p>“Hi, girls,” he says slowly.</p><p>“Hi Daddy!” they say, voices overlapping. They nearly fall over each other trying to get close enough to wrap themselves around Billy’s legs. He leans over to hang his bag on the hook next to the door, then untangles them so he can crouch down.</p><p>“How was your day?” he asks. Violet unravels his hand so she can hold it while Claudia tries to sit on his knee. Even with him crouched, it’s still a little high for her to manage on her own, so she winds up mostly just leaning against him.</p><p>Up close, his suspicions are pretty much confirmed, but the way they’re acting tells him there’s more to it. They’re both wearing sparkly eyeshadow all over the upper half of their faces and have lipstick smeared messily over their mouths. The crooked black swoosh next to their eyes gives him a hint as to whose makeup this must be, if they’re trying to copy her cat eye.</p><p>“It was good,” Claudia says. “Auntie Max was here in the morning and we had pancakes and then we went swimming.”</p><p>“I falled down!” Violet says, trying to pull one of her chubby little legs up so he can see her scraped knee. Billy kisses the tips of his fingers and presses them lightly against the scrape, and she hums happily.</p><p>“And then Dad came home?” he asks. Violet says <em>yeah!</em> but Claudia must still be trying to cover up whatever they did—to <em>Steve?</em>—because she raises her voice over Violet.</p><p>“And after the pool, we went to the grocery store with Auntie Max and we buyed stuff to make cookies!”</p><p>“Cooookies!” Violet sings from the back of her throat.</p><p>“And then Dad came home,” Billy prompts.</p><p>“And <em>then</em> we came home and we made cookies!”</p><p>“I made one that looks like a turtle.”</p><p>“No, you didn’t, it looks like a dog.”</p><p>“It’s not a dog, it’s a turtle!”</p><p>“It’s definitely a dog, Violet.”</p><p>“I bet it’s a beautiful dog-turtle,” Billy interjects before Violet can start bawling. He has to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from laughing.</p><p>“I made a cat,” Claudia says.</p><p>“We made snickedy doodle doops!”</p><p>“And while we were waiting for the cookies to finish baking in the oven, we colored in our coloring books outside.”</p><p>“Uh-huh.” It’s obvious they’re getting to the part in the story where Steve got home from work and Max left for class because Claudia’s eyes go very round.</p><p>“And then I had to pee, so I went pee.”</p><p>“I went pee-pee too!”</p><p>“No, you didn’t.”</p><p>“Yes, I did! I did in the big girl potty! Daddy, I did in the big girl potty, you can ask Auntie Max, she knows I went pee-pee.” Billy runs a hand through her hair.</p><p>“I’m very proud of you both for peeing in the big girl potty. What happened next?”</p><p>Claudia opens her mouth, but her neck flicks over to stare in horror at the hallway when she hears Steve’s footsteps. She squeaks and goes running as fast as she can, straight down the hallway past Steve.</p><p>“Woah, hey,” Steve says, and then Violet yells <em>wait for me!</em> and goes after Claudia. There’s a noise that sounds like Violet slipping and starting to fall and Steve catching her, probably at the wrist, and he goes, “There you go, big girl,” and her little feet continue pounding down the hall.</p><p>Billy is still crouched on the ground when Steve comes around the corner, which is lucky, because he promptly falls onto his ass when he gets a look. He’s glad the girls are gone so he can cackle and doesn’t have to pretend he wants to be an adult about this.</p><p>“Hi to you too,” Steve says, looking amused. “What’s going on there, pops?” Billy reaches out his arms for Steve to pull him up, and when he’s on his feet, Billy grabs his shoulders and turns him towards the mirror. “What the—”</p><p>Steve’s wearing about ten times the amount of sparkly glitter eyeshadow the girls are and ten times as many colors. His cat eye extends from his eye to his ear, weirdly, and is just a straight line with some squiggles through it, and he has lipstick on both his cheeks as well as sort of on his mouth. Claudia’s purple barrettes are clipped into his hair but aren’t clipping anything back; they just hang there, half in Steve’s face. He pushes them back so they can both see one of Violet’s unicorn bauble earrings glittering there.</p><p>“Look,” Billy laughs. He wraps his arms around Steve from behind and kisses his neck. “I didn’t realize that getting the world’s sexiest husband would include <em>also</em> getting the world’s sexiest wife, but you do <em>not</em> see me complaining. If I knew chicks could look this hot, I may have thought about giving them the time of day.” He flicks Steve’s earring and buries his face at the back of Steve’s neck to cackle some more.</p><p>“Babe, I didn’t give you a kiss yet,” Steve says suddenly, and then he’s turning around in Billy’s arms, trying to grip at the back of his neck. “That’s so rude of me. Come here, let me give you a kiss to welcome you home.”</p><p>“Get the fuck off me,” Billy laughs, trying to keep Steve’s face away from him without getting glitter on his hands. They’ve been together long enough that Steve knows playing dirty is always an option, is the <em>preferred</em> option, so he bends his knees a little bit, yanks up Billy’s shirt, and blows a raspberry on the center of his chest. “<em>Steve</em>!”</p><p>“Welcome home, baby,” he says, rubbing his forehead against Billy’s stomach. When he stands up again, he looks even worse than he did before and it’s hard to hold back a laugh, so he doesn’t.</p><p>“You look like a drag queen got sucked through a wind tunnel,” he says.</p><p>“I fell asleep,” Steve says unnecessarily. “This is what your monster children have done to me.”</p><p>“<em>My</em> monster children,” Billy splutters. He lets Steve kiss him now. “Claudia was in here dragging her alibi <em>on</em> and <em>on</em> and <em>on</em>. She <em>really</em> didn’t know where she was going with it. Classic Harrington move, babe, you can’t deny that.”</p><p>“Classic Harrington,” Steve scoffs. He starts patting Billy down like he’s looking for something and Billy jerks away from him on instinct, then gives him <em>a look</em>. “Shut up, I’m not feeling you up, I’m looking for your wallet.”</p><p>“Are you mugging me in my own house?”</p><p>“You clearly need a reminder of what your last name is,” Steve says, giving up so he can wind his arms around Billy’s neck. “<em>Classic Harrington</em>.”</p><p>They can hear careful footsteps coming down the hall, and when they turn, Violet and Claudia are peering around the corner.</p><p>“Are you mad?” Violet asks in a small voice.</p><p>Billy sniffs at them. “A little bit, actually.” He watches their faces fall. “How come Dad gets to look so pretty and you haven’t offered to do <em>my</em> makeup yet?”</p><p>Both of their faces light up and they’re running back down the hallway, squabbling, each trying to get through the doorway and into the living room where they’ve probably left Max’s makeup scattered all over the floor.</p><p>“Hi,” Steve says, bumping their noses together, after they’ve listened to the girls arguing loudly over which colors to use. He looks like everything Billy’s ever wanted and never thought he could have. Steve’s looking at him like he’s thinking the exact same thing.</p><p>“I love you,” Billy says. Steve wrinkles his nose and kisses him on the cheek.</p><p>“Are we even old enough to qualify as cheeseballs?” He says it with a smile, and Billy knows he loves it, loves to hear it, can fall to beautiful pieces if Billy lays heavy into the love-speak. He <em>loves</em> being cheesy, loves it even more when Billy starts it. “I love you, too.”</p><p>Steve kisses him one more time to the sound of little feet on the floorboards and <em>daddy, we’re ready! </em>echoing in the hall before he’s pushing Billy in their direction and ushering him along to his makeover.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>hehe I hope you can't tell I have never spoken to a child in my life</p><p>obviously the little girl with makeup meme served as inspiration</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. did you think this fool could never win?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The first thing Billy sees is Steve Harrington crouched above him. That’s what tells him he’s in heaven. He wouldn’t believe he got in, but this right here, this is all the proof he needs.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "ew, your hand is sweaty"<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>CW</b>: vomiting, blood, the normal gore you would expect following the battle at starcourt<br/><b>TAGS</b>: post battle at starcourt, post season/series 3, billy hargrove has a crush on steve harrington, russian drugs, billy lives, billy spends most of this thinking he's a floating head, he and steve are like. rill high, probably unreliable narrator lol, billy is gross</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first thing Billy sees is Steve Harrington crouched above him. That’s what tells him he’s in heaven. He wouldn’t believe he got in, but this right here, this is all the proof he needs.</p><p>But then the details start filtering in. Harrington’s face is all fucked up – so, all right, hell is going to make him look at all the damage he did to his face. The eye that’s not swollen shut is huge and dilated, which is what makes Billy realize that he feels like he’s just a floating head. A floating consciousness? He feels good-nothing everywhere.</p><p>He’s gone through life accepting that he’s going to hell, but now that he’s here, it’s annoying. First of all, Steve Harrington has clothes on – which should have been a dead giveaway – and, besides, there are a bunch of people in bloody and ripped clothes staring down at him in varying shades of shock. He’s as much of a voyeur as the next guy, but he doesn’t much feel like having an audience of his <em>sister</em> and her dorky friends if he’s about to get felt up by Steve Harrington.</p><p>“Holy <em>shit!</em>” he hears one of them say.</p><p>Harrington—Harrington’s pretty, though, even under all that blood. Billy is unashamed to admit he’d clean his face up with his mouth, make sure there’s nothing left but clean, pink skin. It’s not like he hasn’t thought about it before.</p><p>“Am I in hell,” he manages to ask. Above him, Harrington makes a noise that Billy’s never heard him make before, and it takes him a minute to realize he’s laughing, open-mouthed and goofy and silent. His eye goes squinty and his nose scrunches up and if Billy didn’t feel so good-nothing everywhere, maybe he’d think it was fucked up that he had to die to get Steve Harrington to look at him like that. To look at him without hate or fear or, worse, <em>indifference</em>.</p><p>“You fucking died,” Harrington says. “I was gonna go home and ralph, like, a million times. It was so fucked up, man.”</p><p>“Alright,” he says.</p><p>“You’re alive though. We think.”</p><p>Billy blinks hard a number of times as if that’s going to clear up the picture for him. All it does is make Harrington mirror him, <em>blink blink blink</em> right back. Being alive explains the clothes, and all of the randos, but it doesn’t explain why he’s literally just a floating brain.</p><p>Harrington reaches out a finger to poke at a spot on Billy’s cheek, and then at the tip of his nose. Billy’s focus zeros in on his fingers and he does his best to kiss them as they continue poking around. Billy’s not sure if Harrington’s looking for something or if his face is just particularly pokeable at the moment.</p><p>When Harrington pulls his hand back, it’s covered in black goop, which both of them look at with confusion and curiosity. Billy wants to touch it. Harrington wipes it on his shorts and Billy opens his mouth to say <em>Am I really fucking high or are you dressed like Donald Duck</em> but what comes out is, “I’m gonna barf.”</p><p>Being only a head makes it really hard to throw up not on yourself, so he does that first, and then Harrington takes pity on him and turns his head to the side so he can spit onto the tiled floor. One of the dweebs Max hangs out with goes <em>alright, my turn</em>, and shoves past Harrington into Billy’s field of vision. It’s kind of annoying, because now he’s just a barf-covered head on a barf-covered tile floor, and he doesn’t even get the luxury of looking at Steve Harrington dressed like a cartoon character.</p><p>“Okay,” the little nerd says. “State your name.” When Billy doesn’t say anything, the kid gives him a light slap on the cheek.</p><p>“<em>Ow</em>,” he says. “Fuck off, your hands are sweaty. That’s nasty.”</p><p>“Whatever. If you had to say one word to convince me that you’re human and not—”</p><p>“Are you giving him a <em>Turing test?</em>” someone else asks in what sounds like disbelief but might be exasperation.</p><p>“Shut up! I’m concentrating! –one word to convince me you’re human and not an evil shadow monster from another dimension, what would you choose?”</p><p>Billy stares at him for what feels like seven straight months and eventually goes, “What?”</p><p>There’s some spluttering and a hand shoots out to shove him back onto his ass. Billy follows the arm, which is still unfortunately not attached to Steve Harrington. Billy had arms once. That was pretty cool. There’s an awful lot of things you can do with arms.</p><p>It’s Maxine, her face bright red and tear stained. Her chin wobbles when she looks at him.</p><p>“That was really stupid of you,” she says, trying to sound harsh. She’s giving him a look that usually means she wants to sock him in the arm or at least pinch him, but she doesn’t, which clues him in to the fact that other people have noticed he’s only a floating head. “Don’t do that again.”</p><p>“I’m sorry,” he says, because there’s an urgent need bubbling up in his throat—does he have a throat?— to say that to her. He doesn’t know why, only has a short attention span and focus, but it’s something she needs to know. “I didn’t mean to. He made me.”</p><p>She starts crying again and leans over like she’s going to hug him, but she must realize it’s a little weird to hug just a head, because she stops herself.</p><p>“What happened to my body,” he says. There are hands pulling Max back and then it’s Harrington again. “Oh. Hi, Harrington.”</p><p>“My name’s Steve,” he laughs. “I think. You’re Billy, I know that. Max told me. Right?” He turns his head to look over his shoulder and nods at Billy when he looks back. “Yeah, you’re Billy.”</p><p>“Steve,” he says. “I need you to be straight with me.” For whatever reason, that makes Harrington break out into a fit of giggles, which makes <em>Billy</em> break out into a fit of giggles. He doesn’t know what they’re laughing about but Steve’s hand is suddenly on his shoulder and <em>oh shit</em> he has a shoulder. “I have a shoulder,” he says. “Steve, I have a shoulder.”</p><p>“You have two shoulders.” Steve reaches out and taps them both. “See? One, two.”</p><p>“I thought I was just a head,” Billy says, which makes Steve laugh again.</p><p>“You would look so stupid,” Steve tells him.</p><p>“Naw, I would look so badass.”</p><p>“You wouldn’t even have an ass.”</p><p>“How fucking high are we right now,” Billy says.</p><p>Steve’s eye gets even bigger when he leans in and whispers, “As <em>fucking kites</em>.”</p><p>“Stop making him laugh,” someone who is not Steve says. “You’re making it worse.”</p><p>“Oops.” Steve looks down at him. Which is, like. The dream. “Stop laughing, you’re making it worse.” That makes them both laugh.</p><p>When somebody grabs Steve by the shoulders, ignoring his little <em>hey!</em> as he falls back on his ass, Billy moves to push himself up a little, at least so he can confirm that he does, in fact, have a body that extends past his head and shoulders, but seven hundred voices go <em>no!!</em> which does give him pause. Nancy Wheeler and some chick he doesn’t know are sitting on either side of him at his hips and he looks down to see what they’re doing. Everyone goes <em>no!!</em> again, but it’s too late: he’s looking at his own bloody guts in his own torn-open abdomen, and it’s no wonder Steve got him blitzed off his ass.</p><p>“Those,” he says slowly, quickly losing use of his tongue, “are my insides.”</p><p>He hears Harrington go <em>goodnight, Billy!</em> and feels small, warm hands cradling his neck so he doesn’t crack it on the ground, and then he lets unconsciousness overwhelm him.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>someone take away my computer lol</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. it's always tease tease tease</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Steve’s in the middle of the hall staring up at the ceiling and Mike’s brain takes a few seconds to catch up with him. Steve’s shirtless, which makes sense, since they’ve been in and out of the pool all day, but he’s not wearing his swim trunks anymore. It’s so much worse.</p><p>Mike makes a cut-off choking noise and stares, confused. When Steve notices him, his eyes go big and round, and it’s only then that Mike sees the rope around his wrists and how it goes up to loop through one of the support beams above. </p><p>“Holy shit,” he hisses.</p><p>“Mike, go upstairs,” Steve whispers urgently. “It’s fine, I’m fine.”</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I originally wrote this to be part of a little series as an addition to in the locust wind. it was going to be little stories about how everyone in the party found out billy and steve are together. most of them are very sweet. AND THEN THIS. anyway, I figured it's either going to take me 75 years to finish it or it's not going to get done at all, so I'm just gonna post it here. this can definitely be read without reading in the locust wind, there are just like two passing references to that fic that you might not even notice.</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: I swear, I'm not scared.<br/><b>RATING</b>: M<br/><b>CW</b>: voyeurism, semi-public sex? kind of?, implications of BDSM<br/><b>tags</b>: panties kink, bdsm, steve is tied up, mike is 100% oblivious, assless chaps, roleplaying, there's no on-screen sex but like. u know what's up (but mike doesn't), cowboys, I can't think of any more tags lol, soft billy, lots o' sex bruises, established relationship, overall just very goofy</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><span>“Fuckin’ </span><em><span>sodas</span></em><span>.” Mike puffs out his cheeks and rolls his eyes at Nancy. “Everyone’s </span><em><span>here</span></em><span> and you didn’t </span><em><span>get</span></em><span> enough </span><em><span>fucking</span></em> <em><span>sodas</span></em><span>.”</span></p><p>
  <span>“I swear to God, I’m going to yell for Mom,” she says. Mike rolls his eyes again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really? You’re really going to call for </span>
  <em>
    <span>Mom</span>
  </em>
  <span>? You’re like forty-five years old.” She gasps.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Go get the drinks, Michael.” She fixes him with the same stare she always has, the one she thinks is way more intense and commanding than it actually is, then turns on her heel to walk back outside where everyone else is.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Go get the drinks, Mike,” he mocks. “It’s your graduation party, you better pull your fuckin’ weight. </span>
  <em>
    <span>BLAH BLAH BLAH</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve’s parents’ house is big -- like, kinda small for Loch Nora, but giant to everyone else. It was just supposed to be the original Party and Steve, but Will wanted Jonathan there and Jonathan won’t go anywhere without Nancy, and </span>
  <em>
    <span>Billy</span>
  </em>
  <span> came into town with Steve to celebrate Max’s graduation, and because </span>
  <em>
    <span>Joyce</span>
  </em>
  <span> didn’t have anywhere else to stay in Hawkins, Mike and Nancy’s mom decided to stop by for a while, and when Mrs. Sinclair heard that Mom was going, she wanted to come -- and so on and so on, and basically it feels like the whole town is here. Billy’s been skulking around upstairs mostly so he doesn’t run into any of the parents. Max is coming later with </span>
  <em>
    <span>her</span>
  </em>
  <span> mom, too, and Steve wasn’t very pleased that it turned into a family function.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They put the drinks down in Steve’s parents’ fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>wine cellar</span>
  </em>
  <span> to keep them cool. Mike opens four different doors before he finds the right one. The party also put their alcohol stash down here to crack into later in the day, but no way are they going to get to it with their </span>
  <em>
    <span>moms</span>
  </em>
  <span> here.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The wine cellar is mostly just a long hallway of cubby holes for wine bottles, but there’s a little sitting room at the other end where Steve’s parents entertain. Mike thinks there are extra little hallways that break off from the main part but he’s not sure; he tries to spend as little time down here as possible. The sub basement is creepy but the cool air feels good on his skin, warm from the sun.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve’s in the middle of the hall staring up at the ceiling and Mike’s brain takes a few seconds to catch up with him. Steve’s shirtless, which makes sense, since they’ve been in and out of the pool all day, but he’s not wearing his swim trunks anymore. It’s so much worse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike makes a cut-off choking noise and stares, confused. When Steve notices him, his eyes go big and round, and it’s only then that Mike sees the rope around his wrists and how it goes up to loop through one of the support beams above. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Holy shit,” he hisses.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mike, go upstairs,” Steve whispers urgently. “It’s fine,</span>
  <em>
    <span> I’m fine</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Mike goes closer, looks at the bruises on Steve’s chest and sides. On his thighs and calves. For the first time probably ever, Steve is being kidnapped and doesn’t have a bloody face. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Yet</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Let me untie you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>No</span>
  </em>
  <span>. No, no. I’m okay. I’m alright.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike looks up at the rope and tries to figure out the best way to get Steve down without getting all that near him. From the other side of the room, Mike could see Steve’s got a </span>
  <em>
    <span>semi </span>
  </em>
  <span>through the black lace of his </span>
  <em>
    <span>panties</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and he knows that if he looks down now that he’s up close, it’ll be even worse. Fear boners are a thing though, right? Right?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mike,” Steve says again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is it the Russians again?” Mike pats at his pockets even though he knows he’s wearing swim trunks and there’s nothing in them. “Where’d they go? I can run and get Dustin and Lucas and--”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>No</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Holy </span>
  <em>
    <span>shit</span>
  </em>
  <span>, do </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> get them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It took four of you to fight the Russians at Starcourt and you guys almost </span>
  <em>
    <span>died</span>
  </em>
  <span>. How many are there?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“None,” Steve hisses. “Mike, look, I’m fine, all right? I can get out of these if I want.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike takes a step back, blinking. “Really?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah.” They look at each other for a minute. “I mean, I don’t want to, so I’m not gonna do it. But I could if I wanted to.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did they give you anything?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why are you even </span>
  <em>
    <span>down here</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I needed to get drinks!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We brought soda up </span>
  <em>
    <span>hours</span>
  </em>
  <span> ago, man, I made sure the cooler was stuffed.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, well, everyone and their mom -- </span>
  <em>
    <span>literally</span>
  </em>
  <span> -- is here now, so it’s going fast. I told Nancy to come down here and she wouldn’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shit,” Steve says. “Wait, how many people are here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know. Fifteen? Twenty? I didn’t count.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve’s eyes go a little glassy and his mouth goes round. “That’s a lot of people,” he says. He licks his lips and gets a little fidgety. “And that door up there’s not locked, huh. Anyone could walk in at any time.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Mike scoffs. “That’s why this is a stupid place to put someone if you’re kidnapping them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a echoing sound from somewhere down one of the hallways</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Come out, come out,” a deep voice sing songs from </span>
  <em>
    <span>somewhere</span>
  </em>
  <span>. It’s eerie. Steve’s jaw goes tight and one of his eyes twitch.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Let me get you out,” Mike hisses, reaching for Steve’s wrists.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>No</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Steve tries to shove him back with his knee and Mike makes the mistake of looking down and </span>
  <em>
    <span>oh yes </span>
  </em>
  <span>those panties are way too small and he might actually be harder than when Mike first got here which -- gross.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Heard there’s a pretty young thing out this way yonder,” the voice continues.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is not happening,” Steve mutters, closing his eyes. Mike tries to go around behind him and reach up so his chest is pressed to Steve’s back and he can at least </span>
  <em>
    <span>pretend</span>
  </em>
  <span> Steve doesn’t have a huge boner right now, but Steve wiggles away every time Mike gets close. “Leave it, Wheeler!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Someone’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>coming</span>
  </em>
  <span>. What, you want me to leave and let you die down here alone?”</span>
  <span></span><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Yes</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, tell me how Dustin would take that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s a cowboy gotta do to get a bed ‘round here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>What</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh my God,” Steve says and then Billy comes around the corner.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shit,” Mike says. Billy looks startled to see him. “It’s you, isn’t it? You turned!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mike,” Steve says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What the fuck,” Billy says. He’s wearing a cowboy hat. And </span>
  <em>
    <span>spurs</span>
  </em>
  <span> and he’s carrying what looks like a fucking whip and he’s not wearing a shirt, so all of his scars are on full display. Max said they’re all black, but they’re not; they’re pink like fresh skin. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll scream,” Mike says. “There’s a ton of people upstairs, there’s no way you’re going to kill Steve and get away with it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This cannot be happening,” Steve mutters. Billy continues to look confused.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Wheeler, go upstairs,” he says. Didn’t they all tell Steve this guy was bad news? They should’ve left him in the cabin to rot.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We told you,” Mike says to Steve because he can’t resist, but Steve’s rotated himself to face Billy and his face has gone a little slack-jawed and glassy again. “What did you </span>
  <em>
    <span>give</span>
  </em>
  <span> him?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What is happening,” Billy says. “Steve.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve shakes himself out of whatever drug-induced stupor he’s in. “Uhh, uh. He came down for drinks. There’s, uhh, lots of people upstairs. Like, </span>
  <em>
    <span>a lot</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One of Billy’s eyebrows quirk up and a slow smile comes across his face. “Is that so?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Mike says. “So let Steve go.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is quite possibly the worst thing that’s ever happened to me,” Steve says. He’s trying not to make eye contact with Billy, but his eyes keep straying back to dart over his weird cowboy ensemble. “Can you bury me by the lake when I drop dead of embarrassment in a few minutes here? I like that the sand gets warm in the summer.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Wheeler,” Billy says. His face does a lot of different things. “This is. Uh. I mean, we’re. He’s…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is going really well,” Steve says. Billy shoots him a look.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Wheeler, me and Harrington are about to boink,” Billy says. He puffs out his cheeks. “If I turn around right now, you’re going to see my entire ass. These are not actual </span>
  <em>
    <span>pants</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did saying boink </span>
  <em>
    <span>actually</span>
  </em>
  <span> make this worse?” Steve bites his lip. “I really can’t say.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t get it,” Mike says. He looks between Steve and Billy, but none of it’s adding up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We are,” Billy says, making sure to over-enunciate every word like a </span>
  <em>
    <span>dickhead</span>
  </em>
  <span>, “about to have sex.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Bullshit,” Mike says. “Steve dated my sister. He’s not </span>
  <em>
    <span>gay</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Tell him, Steve.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, tell me, Steve,” Billy parrots cheerfully. Mike glares at him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mike,” Steve says, spinning himself around a little so he’s facing both of them. “Billy and I are dating. We’re, uh. Yeah. He’s my boyfriend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike stares at him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m bi,” he continues. “Uh, like, B-I. Bisexual, not, like. Bye, goodbye! Which is what you should do, you gotta go."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What did you </span>
  <em>
    <span>give him</span>
  </em>
  <span>?” Mike says to Billy, and both Billy and Steve groan.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Kid,” Billy says. He turns so Mike can see the giant hole cut out of his pants, and he’s got </span>
  <em>
    <span>bruises </span>
  </em>
  <span>on his </span>
  <em>
    <span>ass</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ugh!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” Steve says, sounding a little injured. “Be nice. He’s got a good ass.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And this” -- Billy gestures with the whip -- ”is called a crop. Do you </span>
  <em>
    <span>really</span>
  </em>
  <span> want me to tell you what I’m about to do with this?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Christ,” Steve breathes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I just. I don’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>believe you</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Billy groans. “Wheeler, </span>
  <em>
    <span>kid</span>
  </em>
  <span>. I’m gonna get Harrington off but he can’t touch himself </span>
  <em>
    <span>or </span>
  </em>
  <span>me. Look, I’m not into, like, </span>
  <em>
    <span>pain</span>
  </em>
  <span> or whatever, I’m not gonna hurt him. He’s going to get off without me touching him. All right? That make you feel better?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike opens his mouth, but no words come out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Cowboys had cattle whips,” Billy continues. “It’s literally just part of the, the fantasy or whatever. The panties are just ‘cause Steve thinks they’re hot.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Gross,” Mike says. He looks at the both of them. At the bruises all over Steve. At the way Billy’s face is soft -- </span>
  <em>
    <span>embarrassed</span>
  </em>
  <span>, sure, but it’s not the icy scowl he used to always have. It looks like he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>blushing</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mike, get the fuck out of here,” Steve says. “I’m only telling you this ‘cause you’re a dude, but I’m going to, like, bust a fuckin’ nut over here in a minute.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re a freak, Steve,” Billy says, sounding pleased.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s cute that you think my entire focus is on this mortifying conversation. Look, I was single for a </span>
  <em>
    <span>really long time</span>
  </em>
  <span>, my imagination got </span>
  <em>
    <span>really </span>
  </em>
  <span>good, okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Billy nods, looking impressed. “You heard the man,” he says to Mike. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>Git</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mike looks over at Steve’s dumbstruck face one more time before he bolts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t forget your drinks!” Billy yells behind him.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. once upon a time not so long ago</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>He gets dinner with his parents when they’re in town in the spring. His mom tells him all about the lodge they stayed in when they visited Basque Country over Christmas, as if he even knows where that is, and the way she says our room overlooked a little lake dredges up a memory. He waits for his mom to finish rambling about unimportant little details like the color of the drape tassels before he asks his dad if they still have the cabin up in Maine. The fleeting wistful look on his face tells Steve he’d forgotten about it, too. He clears his throat, the moment passing, and says, “Yes, I believe we do,” and Steve’s not really thinking when he says, “Can I take a trip up there?”</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>heheheh if you follow me on tumblr (hectordelavega) you might recognize this as a more polished version of what happens when you spend an entire weekend lying on the couch and watching maine cabin masters on diy network. despite watching A LOT of episodes, timelines are horrifically inaccurate in this, but pretend they're not.</p><p><b>PROMPT</b>: "is he coming home?"<br/><b>RATING</b>: T<br/><b>CW</b>: vague reference to steve's emotional trauma from the upside down (but that's tit for tat these days, huh)<br/><b>TAGS</b>: maine: freeform, emotionally constipated young men who can't communicate, cabin restoration, getting together, billy is Always Prepared, lake life, skinny dipping</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The Harringtons have a cabin on a lake in Maine; it’s called None the Richer, had been for decades before they bought it. They used to go every summer as a family, just the three of them, to swim in the lake and catch fish from the dock and make s’mores outside at the little campfire. Then Steve’s dad got the promotion he’d been working towards and they didn’t go much of anywhere anymore, at least not as a family.</p><p>Steve moved out of his parents’ house at twenty after being rejected from all of the colleges he applied to for a second time. Five years later, he still lives by himself in a shitty little apartment complex on the opposite side of town from Loch Nora. Still works at the same shitty job that doesn’t make him feel anything at all; not miserable, but not happy, either. He has plenty of savings from the government coverup, but he has nothing to spend it on. The kids are gone, away at college. He’s in his mid-twenties and complacent and isn’t all that motivated to change anything.</p><p>He gets dinner with his parents when they’re in town in the spring. His mom tells him all about the lodge they stayed in when they visited Basque Country over Christmas, as if he even knows where that is, and the way she says <em>our room overlooked a little lake</em> dredges up a memory. He waits for his mom to finish rambling about unimportant little details like the color of the drape tassels before he asks his dad if they still have the cabin up in Maine. The fleeting wistful look on his face tells Steve he’d forgotten about it, too. He clears his throat, the moment passing, and says, “Yes, I believe we do,” and Steve’s not really thinking when he says, “Can I take a trip up there?”</p><p>His parents are surprised and Steve gets the feeling they’re surprised that he’s actually interested in doing anything at all, which. Not unfair. Maybe he just likes things simple these days. His dad can’t remember where he put the keys but carefully writes the address on the little company branded notepad he keeps in the inside pocket of his jacket and tells Steve to find a locksmith who can get him inside.</p><p>He subleases his apartment (to his landlord’s absolute astonishment) and leaves. He doesn’t say goodbye beyond telling his boss he’s quitting; everyone important is either away at school or away doing whatever it is you do when you’re moving on with your life.</p><p>It takes a while to get up there, but he does, eventually. The cabin is hard to find and it looks so bad on the outside that Steve has to triple check the address on the adjacent cabins to make sure it’s the right place. He thinks it’s maybe not just him who hasn’t been here in almost twenty years.</p><p>He stays in a hotel and gets up early to meet the contractor. She looks like she’s holding in a laugh when she introduces herself as Kali and Steve doesn’t know if he’s got something on his face, or if it’s the way the dry sesame seed bagel he grabbed from the breakfast bar on the way out is hanging out of his mouth, or if he just has the general air of someone who doesn’t have their life together due to repressed trauma and immobilizing fear. Maybe all three.</p><p>“Look,” she says. “I’m going to be straight with you. This place is literally falling to bits.” Steve doesn’t know what to say, so he just nods in agreement. “We’ll do what we can, but I guarantee that a rehab is going to make your budget look like pocket change.”</p><p>Steve doesn’t really want to say it’s his dad’s money, just in case it makes her want to laugh in his face even more, so he shrugs and says, “Let’s do it,” and watches her pick the lock.</p><p>The foundation is rotted out. The floor is rotted out. The porch is rotted out. She points at things and says any variety of <em>that has to go</em> or <em>we’d start by replacing that</em> or <em>watch your step, looks like a porcupine’s chewed through there</em>. They need to hire a plumber and a landscaper and an electrician, and probably an exterminator, too, and Kali doesn’t say anything when she watches him write a check for half the amount she quotes. She gives him a calculating look with kohl-rimmed eyes and says, “All right. I’ll get a crew in tomorrow morning.”</p><p>Steve shows up at seven after picking at the unappetizing options that make up the complimentary breakfast, mostly because he doesn’t have anything else to do. There’s already a truck parked outside and a tall guy with a beanie shoved low over his forehead is bodily tearing the porch off the front of the house. Steve tries not to be intimidated – reminds himself it’s so rotted through that it probably doesn’t take that much muscle – and heads over.</p><p>“Hi,” he says and has to stand there a minute before the guy looks at him. “I’m Steve Harrington. Who’s the project manager on this job?”</p><p>Kali is, apparently, and when he climbs through the hole where the front door used to be, he can see her leaning over the sink. She shouts <em>no. No. Still no.</em> out the window to her right as the water continues to run, and then <em>yes that’s it we’ve got it</em> as it cuts off abruptly. She looks unsurprised when she turns around and sees him hovering.</p><p>“Hey, good morning,” he says. “I’m here to help.”</p><p>“You’re paying us to do this for you. You know that, right?” But she must take pity on him because she calls <em>hey Hargrove, get up here</em> out the window. A guy with his hair pulled into a tight bun at the nape of his neck heaves himself in through the front door hole with much more grace than Steve had. “Hey,” he says, all silk, when he sees Steve.</p><p>“Billy, this is Steve Harrington, <em>the homeowner</em>.” She stresses the word enough that Steve literally cannot <em>not</em> notice the emphasis. He turns a laugh-huff into a small cough when Billy rolls his eyes. His palm and fingers are rough with calluses when they shake hands and Steve would be stupid not to think about what that would feel like on his skin.</p><p>“Billy Hargrove,” he says, the a in his voice pulling out a little. “Head carpenter.”</p><p>“Steve’s here to help with demo,” Kali says.</p><p>“Well,” Billy says. He gives Steve one of the most obvious once-overs he’s ever seen. “Welcome aboard. You’re gonna help me knock down these interior walls, pretty boy. Don’t let me hear you complaining if you break a nail.”</p><p>Billy shows him how to use a stud finder and how to cut into the walls to make sure there aren’t any loose wires running through, and then he fucking <em>kicks the wall in </em>and gives Steve a wild grin, all teeth and tongue, as the drywall dust settles onto his shoulders and hair.</p><p>Steve doesn’t bother lying to himself: he comes back every day to see Billy. He’s there to help, obviously, but he’s more interested when Billy’s the one showing him how to build things or standing at his shoulder and watching him staple the trim onto the wall or bringing him lunch when he gets food for the rest of the crew. He’s funny and sharp, almost biting, and it feels <em>good</em> to leave that small-town, polite-to-your-face-ness behind.</p><p>He tells Steve about how he lived in San Diego for a while before his parents split, and his mom didn’t want him living with his dad, so she sent him to live with a friend who had moved to Bangor a few years before. He says Susan is a little ditzy but she means well, and his voice gets a little tighter when he tells Steve she never gave up on him, even in high school, when things were rough and Billy’s future was questionable at best. He calls her daughter <em>my sister</em> and gets a pinched expression on his face when he talks about how she’s been going through her teenage angst phase since she was eight, and about how they’re still figuring out how to co-exist peacefully, even twenty years later.</p><p>It takes a month for them to take out the rotted lumber and to fix the foundation and floor and porch and roof. Billy shows Steve the crumbly mess in the insulation that means he has ants. Steve helps make the framing for the bathroom and bedroom walls and helps lay the stones for the walkway down to the lake. He spends all day at the work site, then goes back to the hotel, has dinner, and crashes. Rinse and repeat. He spends the days the crew isn’t working exploring the area sort of idly and missing the smell of sawdust.</p><p>When Kali declares the place habitable, Steve buys a mattress and drops it onto the floor in the master bedroom, which is framed out but still missing real walls. He checks out of the hotel and buys some groceries and spends his evenings down at the lake, his own private little waterfront. He tries reading but the only salvageable book in the cabin is <em>Walden</em> and he can’t even make it past the first page.</p><p>He hears Axel and Mick talking about a meteor shower one night, so once the crew is gone and the sky is turning purple-navy, he goes down to the lake and lays back to look at the stars. They’re brighter out here, brighter even than in Hawkins, somehow, and the sky feels endless. For some reason, its vastness doesn’t overwhelm him.</p><p>He turns to look over his shoulder when he hears footsteps crunching through the undergrowth in his direction. “Just me,” Billy calls through the dark. He emerges from the trees in a red shirt, unbuttoned to where it’s tucked into his jeans. His hair is down and curly and he’s wearing cologne, too, and Steve is still processing this when Billy drops down heavily next to Steve. He passes over a beer and a hamburger wrapped in greasy foil and grins when he says, “Earth to Harrington.”</p><p>They talk and they sit in comfortable silence and then they talk again. Billy seems to be getting closer and closer until their shoulders and thighs are pressed together and their elbows are knocking. When Billy turns to look at him, their noses almost brush, and Steve knows Billy doesn’t miss the way Steve’s eyes drop to his mouth.</p><p>“Have you swam in the lake yet?” he asks, surprising Steve. He smiles widely when Steve shakes his head and then he’s up and stripping down and is in the water, wet hair slicked back over his head, before Steve’s brain has even puttered beyond looking at Billy’s mouth. “Come on in, pretty boy!” he calls. “Water’s fine!”</p><p>He unabashedly watches Steve undress and reaches for him immediately once he’s in the water. He puts a light hand on his hip, and when Steve doesn’t move back, he slips one arm around Steve’s waist, and then the other, and their knees bump under the water. Billy noses at Steve’s cheek. Kisses him on the chin and the corner of the mouth before he kisses his bottom lip. They kiss and kiss, the water not even up their collarbones, and Steve has never been so aware of the night noises around them. Cicadas in the tree. A loon some ways away. Something shrieks in the distances and it startles Steve enough that he stumbles a little in Billy’s grip and Billy tights his hold, tilts his chin closer again, and whispers, “Just a fisher cat,” into the crease of his lips.</p><p>They start heading back to the cabin before Billy makes them double back for the food wrappers and beer bottles, and Steve grabs their clothes just so he has something to do with his hands. He’s never run naked through the trees before but there’s something freeing about it. For some reason, the trees out here don’t look as threatening as the ones in Hawkins. Maybe they’re older, wiser. Maybe they’ve seen more and know how to protect him and Billy and whatever else is out here.</p><p>Steve clears away the painting tarp over the bed and barely has it on the ground before Billy is crowding against him, slick against the small of Steve’s back and hair dripping at the ends over his freckled shoulders. They lose track of time in a cabin they rebuilt together.</p><p>Billy’s hand on his chest is what wakes him up. The sun is filtering in through the windows and Billy is trying to press a mug of coffee into his hands. Steve doesn’t own mugs or coffee or a coffee maker, not in Maine. He sits up and leans against the wall, right where they’ve sketched out the custom headboard Billy’s going to help him carve, and lets the blanket pool around his waist in a way that has Billy’s gaze dropping, the apples of his cheeks going pink. He looks good in the morning sun, in the little bits of dust floating through the air.</p><p>“Where’d you find the coffee maker?” Steve asks after his first sip. “And the change of clothes?”</p><p>Billy gives him a big shark smile but sounds a little sheepish when he says, “I was hedging my bets on needing… morning provisions.”</p><p>Steve makes them eggs and bacon and toast and they sit out on the edge of the new front porch to eat and wait for the rest of the crew to show up. Billy keeps leaning in to kiss his ear, the hinge of his jaw, the side of his neck. Just pecks. They still set Steve on fire.</p><p>Billy stays that night, and the next, and the next, and the next. They go swimming for real, eventually, and play cards, and fall asleep outside in the grass with their fingers twisted together. Out in the open as much as in their own little world. For the first time, Steve relishes the privacy of trees.</p><p>Kali knows something is going on between them, even if he doesn’t know if she figured it out herself or if Billy told her. When it’s just the three of them in the room, Billy likes to pitch his voice down, low enough to be husky, for Steve to feel it in the pit of his stomach, but still loud enough for Kali to overhear him giving Steve directions. <em>Pull out a little</em>, he’ll say, all breathless, when they’re fitting the doorframes. <em>Now push it back in. Harder. Mm. Yeah, Steve, right there.</em> Steve doesn’t know if it’s meant to be embarrassing or not but he laughs himself red in the face anyway.</p><p>They finish the cabin over the next six weeks. If Steve hadn’t been there every day for almost three months, he might have thought he’d gotten the address wrong. It <em>looks</em> like a cabin, first of all. The outside is a soft brown that blends in with the trees. There’s a little living room with a couch and a little table with two artfully mismatched chairs in the kitchen. There’s a huge window in the master bedroom overlooking the lake. Steve has never really felt drawn to the water, not as a non-Great-Lakes-adjacent Midwesterner, but every time he looks out over the water, he wonders if he even wants to go back to Hawkins at all.</p><p>I feels weird giving Kali the second half of the payment knowing he won’t see her again. He gives her a hug and she pats him awkwardly on the elbows until he lets go. One by one, the rest of the team leaves, and it’s not until Steve is standing alone in the fading sunlight that he realizes that Billy’s gone, too.</p><p>It’s the first time Billy’s just left without saying anything about where he’s going or if, when, he’s coming back. That deep, dark part of Steve says they were just fooling around during the job, but he drinks a beer and tells himself to get a grip. He makes a sandwich, lays in bed, showers. Doesn’t know what to do with himself now that the cabin’s built and Billy’s gone.</p><p>He’s lying on the couch and staring up at the ceiling when the sound of a key scraping in the lock has him on his feet on instinct to do – <em>something</em>, he really didn’t think that far ahead – but then the door wedges open and Billy’s head appears around it.</p><p>“Sorry,” he says when he sees Steve standing wide-eyed next to the couch. “Didn’t mean to scare you. We just—Kali forgot to give you back your spare.”</p><p>“Oh,” Steve says, watching him reach out and hang the keyring around the hook next to the door. It overlaps Steve’s set. “Thanks.”</p><p>Billy gives him a little smile and drops his eyes like he’s going to leave, but they both make a little noise in the same moment and Billy’s smile reappears around the door, wide but shy.</p><p>“Keep it,” Steve says. “You can start locking up after you leave.”</p><p>Billy slides the rest of the way past the door, and it’s only now that Steve can see his other arm; there’s a small duffle thrown over his shoulder and a bottle of cheap grocery store champagne in his hand.</p><p>“I was hoping you’d say that,” Billy says. Now that Steve’s shown his hand, it’s like Billy’s found his footing again. He drops the bag and goes over to the cabinet to pull out two mugs and sets them on the counter. Steve drifts over without really meaning to and Billy wraps an arm around his waist to kiss the corner of his mouth. “I heard someone’s the owner of a brand-new home,” he says against Steve’s jaw. He presses the bottle into his hands, the foil already peeled off at the cork. “You wanna do the honors?”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>if you haven't heard the noise a fisher cat makes, please look it up right now. it's horrible. i learned about it from a fic. i was in portland for two days (those donuts tho) but have no first-hand experience with maine cabins or maine wildlife, just lakefront cabins and loons in sheboygan. </p><p>stay tuned for an actual new piece of writing soon! first draft is done-zo and I'm probably going to post it as a fic rather than as part of this because hoo boy it's hefty for a prompt fic so make sure you're subscribed to my author page or keep an eye out.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>